Sealed — Ephesians 1:7–14 | Season 2, Episode 2

How do you know your salvation is going to last? How do you know God won't take it back? And when life falls apart, how do you hold onto the idea that any of this is part of a plan?

In this episode of the Set Free Stay Free Bible study podcast, host Matt Dawson continues the Season 2 Ephesians Bible study with chapter 1, verses 7–14. Paul moves from the wonder of being chosen to something even more grounding: the guarantee. Your inheritance isn't held together by your effort, your consistency, or how well you finish. It's sealed by the Holy Spirit of God himself — and what God seals cannot be broken.

But Matt doesn't rush past the harder question. What do we do with the idea of God's plan when we're standing in the middle of real pain, real loss, real brokenness? This episode holds that tension carefully — helping listeners understand the difference between God's sovereign plan and the brokenness of a world still waiting to be fully restored under Christ.

Using the SOAP method (Scripture, Observation, Application, Prayer), Matt unpacks what the sealing of the Holy Spirit actually means, why context matters when we read scripture, and why the evidence of the Spirit at work in you is often found in the very fact that you're still wrestling.

This Ephesians Bible study is for anyone who needs something more solid than their feelings to stand on.

In this episode:

• What it means that God purchased our freedom through Christ's blood
• How to read "God's plan" passages without losing people in their pain
• The difference between written to us and written for us
• Why the Holy Spirit is described as a seal and a guarantee
• What the evidence of the Holy Spirit actually looks like in a believer's life
• A closing prayer for trust in God's plan beyond our current circumstances

📖 Passage: Ephesians 1:7–14 (New Living Translation)

🔍 Keywords: Ephesians Bible study, Bible study podcast, SOAP method Bible study, Christian Bible study, Scripture-first Bible study, Set Free Stay Free, Matt Dawson, walking through the Bible, Christian discipleship podcast

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Welcome to the Set Free Stay Free Bible Study Podcast. I'm your host, Matt Dawson. We are in season two. This is actually episode two of uh the book of Ephesus. We're actually in season two studying the book of Ephesus. And I want to start with this question. How do you know your salvation is actually going to last? In reality, how do you know that your salvation is secure? How do you know that what God has done for you, He's not going to take back? How do you know you're going to finish well? Sometimes people say, well, it's only those who finish well that are actually going to be saved. Paul does something in the first chapter in this book of Ephesians to the church in Ephesus. He wants to help them understand that their inheritance, the promises of God, are sealed by the Holy Spirit. That it is not about our effort, it's not about our future or security. It has nothing to do with us and hanging on to things or, you know, again, finishing well on our part, but secured by his promise. If you guys don't already know, we use the soap framework to go through the Bible, which is scripture, observation, application, prayer. And if you would like some assistance in that, we have a resource for you, a free resource. Click the link below in the description or just let me know you want this resource. Just say, I want the soap study resource, and we will get that to you for free to tell you a little bit about how to do this on your own. And actually give you some scriptures to begin to study on your own as well. But as we're gonna break open Ephesians, we started episode one last uh time with the first six verses. I'm gonna read the next several verses to verse seven through fourteen uh that's gonna take us into the second episode of Paul's, again, beginning of his letter to the church in Ephesus. We're gonna start and pray first, and then we're gonna read. Heavenly Father, by your Holy Spirit's power, just reveal to us your word, your living, active, breathing word, so that we may hear from you individually and together today through this podcast what you want us to know. We pray this with confidence in your son's name, Jesus. Amen. Let's start in verse seven together. He, speaking of Jesus Christ, he is so rich in kindness and grace that he purchased our freedom with the blood of his son and forgave our sins. He has showered his kindness on us, along with all wisdom and understanding. God has now revealed to us his mysterious will regarding Christ, which is to fulfill his own good plan. And this is the plan. At the right time, he will bring everything together under the authority of Christ, everything on heaven and on earth. Furthermore, because we are united with Christ, we have received this inheritance from God, for he chose us in advance, and he makes everything work out according to his plan. I'm going to pause here because I want you to see those first few declarations in this letter. He's not only talking about the kindness and grace of God, we talked a little bit in episode one about being chosen, and where we're chosen in advance, and he kind of repeats that again a little bit more in this letter because of what Christ purchased through the blood of him, the blood of Christ, God gives us this promise and forgives our sin. But there's something that comes up here that I know some people struggle with. He says, God has revealed to us this plan. Now he's going to go on and explain what that plan is, but when you start reading these verses independently, when you start taking stuff out of context, sometimes these things happen in Christian life. They'll start talking about, well, he chose everything in advance and uh he makes everything work out according to his plan. And there are people walking through tragedy. There are people who have experienced such horrific pain in their past that have a hard time when these verses are pulled out like this and just go, was that God's plan? Was his plan to hurt me that way? Was his plan to cause me to go through this horrific thing? Was it his plan to destroy my family? Was it his plan to allow this person, this drunk driver, to kill my family member? Like, everybody with me, like understand sometimes people will grab things like this and be like, well, God just works everything out according to his plan. And he'll they'll read nine other verses that basically mean the same thing. And we can get so micro-focused on our pain, on the brokenness of this world, on the things we've experienced, or maybe even the stuff we're walking through today, and have a very hard time swallowing that bigger picture. Like, oh, like, do I have to accept that this is part of God's plan? That he in advance knew this. We actually just had a baptism at our church recently, and uh one of the testimonies was basically sharing that same thing. Like he he prayed and fasted about getting married, and then he got married, and it was really not a great marriage, and man, he just struggled and it ended after five years, and he went through so much pain, and he he did. He was honest with God. Like, is this didn't you know that's what was gonna happen? Couldn't you have stopped this? Couldn't you have kept me from walking through this pain and heartache in my life? Now, I don't want to get too deep into the theological side of things. I just want to make sure you understand part of what we always do with scripture is we don't just pull out the truth of what scripture is saying, because everything does happen according to God's plan. But part of understanding his plan is how brokenness still functions in this world. Matter of fact, if you go back, just go back up a few verses, right? He talks about the fact that at the right time, right, he's gonna bring everything under the authority of Christ in heaven on earth. Meaning that right now is not necessarily that time, that we still have to deal with the muddy brokenness of our hearts, of our flesh, of other people's things. And there's so much pain and discomfort that come from that brokenness, but yet it doesn't stop God's plans, if that makes any sense. Like, and you know, you start talking about the sovereignty of God, and you start talking about the fact that he may know all of how the brokenness is going to work, and yet somehow in his mosaic, in his will, in his sovereignty, he's still able to work his plan. So it's very hard. I have to tell people all the time, like you're gonna have to pull back from the the thing you're this micro focus of the thing that has caused you pain, which I believe all pain, all tragedy, all sin is part of that brokenness, and it is not God's plan. But yet God's plan is active and at work in and through even that sin, even through man's ability, ability to choose and the pain we experience. Now, I also encourage people to read things contextually. This was a letter written to the church in Ephesus. It was not written to you, it was written for us, it was written for us, it was not written to us. So when we look at context, what does it mean? What was it written to them? Now understand, it doesn't mean that things that were true to them are not true to us, it's still true. And we can't reverse that and say, well, that that that was I don't like that, but we're gonna choose our own truth over here. It's not how it works, but it was written to them. So what he's gonna talk about it, you got to read it in context, right? What's the plan? What is he talking about when he says, hey, all this is God's plan? Here he goes. This is in verse 12, right? God's purpose, right? Going back to his plan was that we Jews who were who were the first to trust in Christ would bring praise and glory to God. And now you Gentiles have also heard the truth, the good news that God saves you. And when you believed in Christ and He identified you as his own by giving you the Holy Spirit, whom he promised long ago, that Holy Spirit or the Holy Spirit is God's guarantee that he will give us the inheritance he promised, and that he has purchased us to be his own people. He did this so that we would praise and glorify him. So understand context, Paul's talking about the plan very clearly. This the plan that Paul is addressing here, not just talking about all his plans, but the plan he's addressing here is like, yeah, the Jews were given the first opportunity by God, his people, to see Christ, accept Christ, surrender to Christ, and be a part of the way. And now, because this part of this plan is now the Gentiles get to do this. Now the Gentiles, right? That by the way, that includes us, unless you're Jewish watching this. That includes us. Like we are, we're part, we're we're we're 2,000 years into this plan that now we get to hear and accept and believe in Christ and what he did for us and believe in God that his restoration comes through Christ. That's all a part of God's plan. He says at one point, you know, at some point, he's gonna bring all the authority, right? Everything. We know this. We've read Revelation, we understand how this all works out. Jesus wins, like that's the way it works out. He's gonna be on the throne, and every knee is gonna bow and every tongue's gonna confess that he's Lord. That's the way it works out. His plan, trust me, is going to happen. But this really cool thing is in here, and I want to make sure we don't skip it. He talks about the fact that there's this beautiful thing that happens in the New Testament. Not that the Holy Spirit didn't exist and work with people and work even through people, but there's this really cool thing that happened when Christ left and he said, I'm gonna send the Holy Spirit. And he was with you before, but now he's gonna be in you. This is in the Gospel of John. He's now he's gonna be in you. And there's this really cool verse, maybe you've heard it in different versions, where we were sealed with the Holy Spirit. There's something incredible about this idea that when we become identified with Christ because we've surrendered our lives to him, he says the Holy Spirit is now this seal, is now the guarantee, right, that we are going to experience all the promises and the inheritance that God has promised us. So when people talk about the Holy Spirit and they don't really truly understand what the Holy Spirit does and how he works, and again, we can't, this is not what this podcast is about necessarily, but one of the things that Paul wants to identify is, hey guys, remember when way back Acts 19, when when you didn't quite understand the whole Jesus thing, you were baptized by the uh disciples of John, um, and you just thought this was a kind of a Jewish offset, you know. Once I explained Christ and you were baptized, you received the Holy Spirit. And they would have probably remembered that moment, right? And they would have remembered the understanding that was so different in terms of the freedom that they were now walking in, and the terms of being chosen by God and having an inheritance. He's like, but understand that there's a there's an element of this that you no longer have to question this, you no longer have to think through again this salvation. Did he just save me from one thing? Did he just save me, you know, again by the I said that last week by the hair of our chinny chin chin, did he just save us out of pity? He says, No, he he chose you. And it gave you it gave him great pleasure to do so. And now we have this Holy Spirit. We have the Holy Spirit of God. It goes on and says later that the same spirit that raised Christ from the dead now resides, now lives in us. And he says, That Holy Spirit was a seal, was a guarantee that now we are gonna experience all the promises. We're gonna be able to experience the fullness of his plan. Like we're gonna be able to experience the fullness of what we read in the end times, what we read what's gonna happen in our future, what we read what happens after we die, we get to experience the fullness of his plan because the Holy Spirit now resides in us. And I think going back to the context, understanding the plan, specifically the way Paul was describing it, I think sometimes that that's a necessary discipline for Christians to pull back from the chaos of our everyday, pull back from the microfocus of pain or betrayal or disappointment or something that we're experiencing because of brokenness, and go back and say, you know what? There is a bigger picture. There is a plan. Isaiah says in Isaiah 55, you know, my thoughts are higher than your thoughts, my ways are higher than your ways. So I'm not even saying we're always fully going to understand the mysterious plans of God. He says, but he says, but there's some of this mystery in Christ that's been revealed, right? Because the plan was through Christ, now you, the Jews first, get to have this relationship, restored relationship with God, walking with the Holy Spirit. And now you, Gentiles, get to have this relationship with God. Just beautiful. And now we get to experience the promise. And it's sealed. I can't continue to go back to like the way they would have understood that in terms of a decree that it's sealed. It cannot be broken, right? It cannot be broken when it is sealed by God and the Holy Spirit is the seal. The Holy Spirit is the evidence. Sometimes people will ask me when they don't know if they're saved. And they don't know because they still struggle with sin or because they still have this thought, or because they still do this, and they still do that, or they're still struggling with something. And I'm like, number one, if you're struggling with sin, at a heart level, you're struggling with sinning, there's already the work of the Holy Spirit in your life. That's usually evidence alone that there's already work of the Holy Spirit in and through you. But the truth of the matter is, is that Romans 8 says our His Spirit unifies with our Spirit to give us that understanding that we are children of God. Like it's a it's an understanding that yes, we may still struggle. Yes, that happens, but the sealing of the Holy Spirit, again, when we trust his word, not our feelings, we trust his word. The sealing of the Holy Spirit is what guarantees us that we not only have surrendered our lives to Christ, but that we are now identified with him and we receive all the inheritance of the family and the promises of God. Let's uh let's end here and pray together in terms of our application of this today. Father God, thank you again for your word. And I know that there are so many, maybe even listening right now today, who are maybe experiencing and maybe currently walking through some really, really painful things, really tragic things. And God, I just it breaks my heart to know that maybe somebody well intending has taken verses out of context and said something about, oh, it's don't worry, it's all according to plan, God's got a plan, and to cause confusion in our hearts that that maybe, maybe this pain was part of his plan. And yet, God, even in your sovereignty, if the pain brings us to something, it wasn't because you wanted us to experience pain. It wasn't because you're not still working a plan and that your plan is going to happen. But God, ultimately, we have to just pull our focus out of that just fixated small window of understanding and know that, God, your thoughts are higher than our thoughts. Your ways are higher than our ways. And so I pray today, God, that people will hear and read this portion of your word and take from it what it really has, this plan to get to know who you are and surrender and be have this relationship, this restored relationship with you. We're so thankful that the plan came into being through Christ and that he did all the work to give us this identity in him. And that God, not only that, but you sealed it. You sealed it with the Holy Spirit. And now the evidence of the Holy Spirit at work in all of our lives is the promise. Not just the promise that you would send him, but the promise that he would live in and through us, and that same power that raised you, Jesus, from the dead, now resides in us. And so, God, we're so grateful, so, so grateful, God, for your word and the way it encourages us beyond our feelings and beyond our current state and circumstances. We trust you. And we trust that, yes, one day, all things in heaven and earth, no more pain, no more sin, no more sorrow, no more brokenness, will all sit under the glorious grace and rule of Jesus Christ. And we are so grateful. We pray this in your name, Jesus. Amen. Thank you guys again. This was episode two. Don't forget to engage with us. You can rate and review the podcast. It's very helpful. And don't forget, you can also, you know, on YouTube, you can actually comment and engage with us. We'd love for the likes and the comments. It definitely helps us get more exposure on YouTube. So we really, really appreciate it. I look forward to seeing you in episode three, season two of Ephesians. Thanks, guys.