Jack was hooking me up. He said, “What are you sharing on?” I said, “Our Heavenly Father.” He said, “Well, I shared on that.” Oh.
So, I teach every two Sundays out of every six, so I missed that message. Jack was very gracious. She said, “No pressure.” So, let’s pray.
Heavenly Father, we do come to You. What a great Father You are, worthy of praise and adoration and bowing and bending the knee. Lord, we just bless Your name this morning.
And I do pray that Your Spirit, Your Spirit sent from the Father, would really open our hearts, Lord, just to see anew these simple points that You’ve given me. Lord, that the Spirit of God would really speak to each one of us. Lord, speak to me even as I share these things.
Lord, they are simple, yet, Lord, You are so precious in the simplicity of Your Word. So, Lord, speak now, we pray. In Your name, I pray. Amen.
The theme verse is Ephesians 1:3, and we’ll be going all over the Scriptures. I’m not expecting you to turn to each one, but if you’d like, that would be great.
Ephesians 1:3:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
Who hath blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.
I had a hard time just getting past the first word of that verse: Blessed. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who—and that refers to the Father—has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.
And as I was considering this before the Lord, He took me in an unexpected direction. So even this morning, He was changing things. So, I just bless the Lord for it. And I realized this message is more for me than probably for you, because I needed to be rearranged in my thinking, in my heart. So I want to praise the Lord for it.
Blessed. What does it mean, blessed? Blessed is simply to praise.
Meyer says it is an emotion of the heart. Isn’t it wonderful? We think of emotion of the soul, but he says it’s an emotion of the heart that is celebratory in its praise. So, when you bless someone, you’re blessing someone from the depth of your heart as a celebration, as it were.
So, this morning, if you do remember nothing else, and we come to the end of the message, I pray that your heart will be able to bless your Heavenly Father with deep-felt, heartfelt emotion, passion that comes from the Spirit of God.
In a day when fatherhood is looked down upon, it’s wonderful to really realize how precious our Heavenly Father is.
Our Father. What we’re going to do is simply go through His birth, the birth of His Son; the walk of His Son; the death of His Son; and His Son being raised up. We’ll see, simply, the Father’s point of view, as it were. And I’m picking out just a few things. The Lord narrowed it down to just a few for me, and I was very grateful for that.
First of all, in Hebrews 1:5, it says:
For unto which of the angels said He at any time,
Thou art My Son,
This day have I begotten Thee?
And again,
I will be to Him a Father,
And He shall be to Me a Son?
There was a time when our Heavenly Father said, “Today, I will be Your Father.” And this is referring to our Lord Jesus being begotten by the Father: “Today, I have begotten You.”
You know, John 3:16 tells us that the Father gave His only begotten Son. John 1:14 says the Father sent His Son. And Galatians 4 says the Father determined the time of Christ’s birth:
But when the fulness of the time was come,
God sent forth His Son,
Born of a woman.
You know, I don’t understand how the pre-existent Christ became incarnate, but He did, and it’s of the Father’s will. The Father sent His Son, and the Father gave His Son. What a wonderful heart our Father had to send His only Son.
And I was thinking, “Lord, how wonderful this is that You put this on my heart months ago, and now I get to share on the day after Christmas.” So we have to read about the shepherds. Turn to Luke 2.
Let’s have some true celebration this morning. I got up at 3:30 this morning, as you often do when you have to share, and I walked out on my porch. Across the street, my neighbors, who I love—they’re very kind—but they celebrate Christmas in a strange way.
They have these balloons every season, column balloons, like statue balloons—you know what I’m talking about? And there were four of these balloons. One was Santa Claus. This is on celebrating the day of our Lord’s birth: Santa Claus.
And beside Santa Claus, lit up at 3:30 in the morning, there was an elf with a Santa Claus hat. Then I looked over, and, oh, there’s another one. It was some kind of bear. I guess it was Winnie the Pooh. And then, of course, Frosty the Snowman.
And I just started laughing, because I want to share a little bit about Luke 2 and the wonderful celebration of the shepherds, and here across the street there’s this—whatever. The world is so strange.
Luke 2:8:
And there were shepherds in the same country abiding in the field,
And keeping watch by night over their flock.
And an angel of the Lord stood by them,
And the glory of the Lord shone round about them:
And they were sore afraid.
I memorized this when I was a kid in King James, and I want to say “sore afraid,” but sore means terrible, right? So, they were sore afraid.
And the angel said unto them,
Be not afraid; for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy
Which shall be to all the people:
For there is born to you this day in the city of David
A Saviour, who is Christ the Lord.
And this is the sign unto you:
Ye shall find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes,
And lying in a manger.
And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host
Praising God, and saying,
Glory to God in the highest,
And on earth peace among men in whom He is well pleased.
Now take note: praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest.” Glory to the Father in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill to men.
You see, Jesus had already been born. So I want you to realize this morning that at the birth of the only begotten Son of the Father, there was great rejoicing in heaven—great celebration.
And as if for these poor, humble shepherds, God tore apart the sky and allowed the praise and worship that was going on in heaven to the Heavenly Father for sending His only begotten Son.
Now, have you ever thought of it that way? I had not: to the glory of God the Father. “Glory to God in the highest.” So, the Heavenly Father is worthy of worship for sending His own Son. Praise the Lord for that. That’s the first point I have.
The second is that this praise and adoration in heaven continues all through the Lord’s life. There were two instances where the Heavenly Father just had a burst of fatherly pride over His Son. Turn to Matthew 3.
Matthew 3:13-17:
Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to the Jordan unto John,
To be baptized of him.
But John would have hindered Him, saying,
I have need to be baptized of Thee,
And comest Thou to me?
But Jesus answering said unto him,
Suffer it now: for thus it becometh us
To fulfil all righteousness.
Then he suffereth Him.
And Jesus, when He was baptized, went up straightway from the water:
And lo, the heavens were opened unto Him,
And He saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove,
And coming upon Him;
And lo, a voice out of the heavens, saying,
This is My beloved Son,
In Whom I am well pleased.
And once again, behold, the heavens were opened—as if the heavens themselves, the sky above our Lord, just kind of ripped open. He saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove and lighting on Him, coming on Jesus. And behold, a voice out of the heavens.
That very heaven was opened, and the voice of the Father said, “This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased.”
“This is My beloved Son.” There are only three times where people heard the voice of God in the Gospels, that I know of: this, the one we’re going to share about, and then one other time when the Father told His Son, “I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.” And they said the voice sounded like thunder.
Well, this is the first time. And the Lord, the Heavenly Father, shouted, as it were, “This is My beloved Son.” The Father had so much love for His Son, He wanted the whole world to know: “This is My beloved Son.”
The Son is beloved by the Father fully and completely, with overwhelming love that we don’t even understand. The Father loves His Son, and He calls Him His beloved Son.
And not only is the Son beloved, but the Father says, “I am well pleased in Him.” This hearkens to Isaiah 42:1, where it says:
Behold, My servant, whom I uphold;
My chosen, in Whom My soul delighteth.
This is the Father’s heart for His Son: one of delight, of great joy. And it is as if the Father is delighting at this point to say, “This One, Jesus, He’s My Son, and He’s beloved by Me. And I want you to know that.”
Now, brothers and sisters, what a wonderful thing that is. Turn to Matthew 17. And we’re going to come back to this beloved aspect.
Matthew 17:1-8:
And after six days Jesus taketh with Him Peter, and James, and John his brother,
And bringeth them up into a high mountain apart:
And He was transfigured before them;
And His face did shine as the sun,
And His garments became white as the light.
And behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elijah talking with Him.
And Peter answered, and said unto Jesus,
Lord, it is good for us to be here:
If Thou wilt, I will make here three tabernacles;
One for Thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elijah.
And then, while he was speaking, the Father interrupted him. The Father said—well, let’s read it:
While he was yet speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them:
And behold, a voice out of the cloud, saying,
This is My beloved Son,
In Whom I am well pleased;
Hear ye Him.
Well, listen to Him. Brothers and sisters, it’s a wonderful thing that the Father once again opened the heavens and spoke in a voice that they could hear: “This is My beloved Son. Listen to Him.”
And you know, I was just thinking this morning, that voice was heard not only here, but through all the principalities and powers, all the darkness. They heard twice, “This is My beloved Son.”
This is right before Jesus is getting ready—He’s foretelling His death in the chapter beforehand. So, the Lord’s death, the coming of what the Lord has to go through, what the Father has to go through—and the Father is saying to all, “This is My beloved Son,” to all who would hear. What a proclamation.
This is an eternal cry, an eternal voice of the Lord God Almighty: “This is My beloved Son.” He will always be My beloved Son. He was My beloved Son before the incarnation. He was My beloved Son while He was on earth, and He will be—and He is—beloved.
He is the beloved Son in eternity past, present, and future. The Son will always be the beloved One of the Father. The Son will always be the recipient of the love of the Father. It never changed and never has changed.
And that one fact, which we’ll see later, is so important to Ephesians 1:3.
Next, we come to the Father’s Son on the cross. You know, because the Father so loved the Son, each step that the Son took—the Son said, “The steps that I take, where I go, what I do, I do in perfect harmony and unity with the Father.”
So, from the Father’s point of view, He was leading, guiding, and supporting His beloved Son all through His walk. And as they approached Calvary, oh, the Father poured out His love on the Lord Jesus and enabled Him to walk.
And when we come to the cross, Isaiah 53 says:
We did esteem Him stricken,
Smitten of God, and afflicted.
Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him;
He hath put Him to grief.
The Heavenly Father, who loved His Son, was pleased to crush His Son for our sake; was pleased to make His Son—let me read the verse. Second Corinthians 5:21:
Him who knew no sin He made to be sin on our behalf;
That we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
He made Him—the Father made Him, the Son—who knew no sin, His Son knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf.
In our Friday night meeting, one brother was sharing how much the Father must have suffered with the Son, even in the Garden of Gethsemane, as the Father and the Son fellowshipped about what was to come. The Son said, “Oh, Father, if possible, take this away.” And the answer was, “No, You have to go through this.”
You know, in Acts, in Peter’s wonderful sermon, he said this was a predetermined plan by the foreknowledge of God. God the Father and God the Son knew this was coming. And the Lord Jesus was led all the way by His beloved Heavenly Father.
But praise the Lord: the Father would not allow His Son to see decay. In Acts 2:31, it says:
He neither was left in Hades,
Nor did His flesh see corruption.
Because in the verse right before that, it said God raised Him up again. So God the Father would not allow His Son to stay in the grave or His body to see decay. He loved His Son so much. He loved us so much, but He would not allow His Son to see decay. He raised Him up.
This Jesus God raised up. He raised Him up from the dead. Praise the Lord for that.
This brought great glory to the Father. You know, when the angels were worshiping at His birth, they said, “Glory to God”—glory to God the Father. And in Philippians 2, when it says He was exalted, He was raised up, it says it’s all done to the glory of God the Father.
So praise the Lord. The Father raised Him up, and the Father seated the Son at His right hand.
Ephesians 1:20 says:
He raised Him from the dead,
And made Him to sit at His right hand in the heavenly places.
But to which of the angels has He ever said:
Sit Thou at My right hand,
Till I make Thine enemies the footstool of Thy feet?
Remember, we’re coming back to Ephesians 1:3. So the Father sent His only begotten Son, the One whom He loved. The Father declared all through His life, “You are My beloved Son, and I rejoice over You with great gladness, and You are the delight of My soul.”
And then He raised up His beloved Son and seated Him at His right hand—right by His majesty on the throne, right beside Him. So praise the Lord for that. This is all the Father’s doing.
The Father timed it to perfection when His Son would come, and the Father led Him all through His life to the very point where He was seated at His right hand again.
Now we come to the part that really touched me. I mean, this all is something we all know. But turn to John 20—no, that’s not it. Oh, no wonder. I mean, John 20.
After the Lord was raised from the dead, He walked among us for a little while before He ascended, right? And He said this to Mary:
Stop clinging to Me,
For I am not yet ascended unto the Father:
But go unto My brethren, and say to them,
I ascend unto My Father and your Father,
And My God and your God.
And I would that you would hear this as if for the first time. So often, we hear so many wonderful things over and over, and it’s just like it loses some kind of import to us.
“I ascend to My Father and your Father.” My Father and your Father. Brothers and sisters, do you realize how precious that is? My Father and your Father.
Over and over again in the epistles, the Lord says—you know that phrase in greetings—“Grace to you and peace from God our Father.” God our Father.
This is the Father of the beloved Son, who is our Father. We share the same Father as the Lord Jesus. Now, if Scripture hadn’t said it, it would be difficult to say that, wouldn’t it?
Hebrews 2 says:
For both He that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified
Are all of One.
So we are from the same Father. Isn’t that amazing? I can look around this room and say, “You have the same Heavenly Father that I do.” And we have the same Heavenly Father that our Lord Jesus has.
The same Father who sits on the throne is our Father—my Father and the Lord Jesus’ Father. That is amazing.
If we would look at each other and consider each other as being sons and daughters of a Heavenly Father who is the same Father, it would change things. Sometimes we get—I do, when I say “you,” I really mean me—kind of myopic. “Oh, He’s my Father.” Yes.
But He’s your Father, the same Father. And the way I think of you should be as if you have a powerful, loving Heavenly Father who is your Father as well as being mine.
And when you think of it that way, it really slaps you across the face when you have a harsh thought about someone, a brother or sister. You can’t, because that brother or sister has the same Heavenly Father that you do.
And even more than that, that brother or sister has the same Heavenly Father that the Lord Jesus has. And that is an amazing thing.
When we come and think of, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,” well, that Father, who is the God and Father of the Lord Jesus, is my God and Father as well. It’s amazing. It’s amazing, brothers and sisters.
And to compound the amazement that I have, you and I are called beloved of God as well. We are called the beloved of our God and Father.
Not only is He my Father, not only do I love Him in a small way, He says, “Roger, you’re My son, and you are My beloved.” Think of that. Each one of you, if you know the Lord Jesus, is beloved by God—by God the Father.
You know, I did not have a good relationship with my father. And he died before we could probably share what he would have wanted to share about how much he loved me, but I never heard it.
Of course, being raised that way, what did I do? I did the same thing. So I’m just as guilty as my dad in not sharing with my children how much I love them.
So it really means something personal to me that I can bless a Father who calls me beloved. You are beloved by your Heavenly Father.
And I want to tell you, just the way the Heavenly Father took delight in His Son, He takes delight in you, His beloved.
What does beloved mean? Excuse me, I just have the sniffles today. What does beloved mean, just in simple English? Kind of a strange word, the more you say it.
But beloved means I am the recipient of someone else’s love. So my wife is my beloved, and I am her beloved, because I receive—I am the recipient of—her love.
William is Judith’s beloved, and Judith is William’s beloved. I am the beloved of my Father, and my Father is my beloved as well. My Father loves His Son; His Son loves His Father.
And brothers and sisters, when I say you and I are beloved, we are beloved by God. And we’re beloved by each other. When I love God the Father and I love you, you are my beloved, and I am your beloved. You are your Father’s beloved.
It’s an amazing, wonderful—beloved. So, it’s our song: “Beloved, let us love one another.” And we are each other’s beloved in the same fashion and manner and quality as we are beloved by our Heavenly Father.
You might say, “No, it can’t be the same. There’s no way.” Well, turn to John 17. Of course, all of you know the proper answer.
But just think of it before you turn there: it’s the same kind of belovedness as the belovedness of the Father and the Son. Because if it is, that’s quite amazing.
John 17:23:
I in them, and Thou in Me,
That they may be perfected into one;
That the world may know that Thou didst send Me,
And lovedst them, even as Thou lovedst Me.
The love that the Father has for the Son is the love that we should have for each other. That love is the same love.
Beloved. The root of that is agape. Beloved is agape—I looked it up. So agape love is just the very core of the brotherly love that we’re to have with each other.
Often Paul said, “Dearly beloved.” Dearly beloved. And each of us not only is dearly beloved by the Father; we should be dearly beloved by each other.
This is the kind of love that is spoken of when the world sees it. They’re astounded, and they should be.
And I said, “Lord, I do not love that way.” I know that I’m beloved of God. And for some of you—no, I shouldn’t even tease about it—I’m beloved by each one of you.
But do you know that I do love each one of you? Probably not. I was thinking, “Well, Lord, what if we just made it a rule?” Which it’s not going to happen, but let’s call each other beloved.
John Blanchard would just slap me across the face and say, “What?” Just teasing you, John.
Beloved, when you greet each other this morning, say, “Hi, beloved in the Lord. Hi, beloved of the Lord.” My wife, I would say, “Hi, dearly beloved.”
But I was thinking, whether you say it or not, I would that we would say that more often, or even some of the time, because it’s a recognition that each one of us, each one of your brothers and sisters, is beloved by the Lord.
Where would gossip be? Where would grumbling and complaining against each other be? No, that person is beloved by my Heavenly Father, who loves me as well.
You see how that love, that belovedness in the body of Christ, is so wonderful.
Okay, to close up, back to Ephesians 1. Let’s—I’m going to turn there.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
Who hath blessed us with every spiritual blessing
In the heavenly places in Christ.
Seated by the Father at this very moment is the beloved Son, whom the Lord even now rejoices over. And don’t you know that His very heart, His heart of delight in His Son being His beloved—if we are blessed in His beloved Son, how is the Father’s attitude or heart in giving every good thing to us?
It is with great joy that our Heavenly Father blesses us in His Son.
We were talking about joy this morning, and I was going to talk about Hebrews 12:2: “For the joy that was set before Him.” This morning it came up. There’s a joy that the Father, as He led His Son through the cross—
You know, it says in Peter—I forgot to say this—that the Son kept entrusting Himself to His Father on the cross, because there was such trust in the relationship of Father and Son. But it says, “For the joy set before Him.”
And it’s been mentioned that the joy on the cross was the joy of the people who would be saved. But you know what? I believe this joy is so extensive; it can be all of this, of course.
There’s a great joy that the Father has, that He would bless you and me with every spiritual blessing because of Christ, His beloved Son; that He blesses us with great joy and delight because you and I are the beloved ones of His Son and His beloved ones.
So, all right, two final points. This love—the Father, I know, when we were born again, He probably said, “These poor people, My children, whom I love, they’re not going to be able to love.”
And He says, “At the request of the Son, I’m going to send My Spirit.” In Romans 5:5, what does it say?
The love of God hath been shed abroad in our hearts
Through the Holy Spirit which was given unto us.
The Heavenly Father, the Father God, says, “I will send My Spirit, and He will shed abroad in their hearts this great love.” And that love is going to be what enables them to know their beloved Father, to know how much they are beloved, and to know each other.
Just to know the love of God is being done by the Spirit, at the direct request of the Son, for us. I found that to be very wonderful.
Finally, in Revelation 22, I struggle with a way to share this. I had this picture of the love of God just going through great floodgates, as if there was a reservoir of God, and it goes through these floodgates.
You know, when the floodgates open—you’ve seen the pictures of this huge reservoir—when they open wide, the pressure of it just comes out like the floodgates.
And in Revelation 22, it says:
And he showed me a river of water of life, bright as crystal,
Proceeding out of the throne of God
And of the Lamb.
That’s God the Father, and the throne of the Lamb—that’s the beloved Son. And there’s a river of life that flows from God the Father to you and me that is clear as crystal and wonderful.
And this blessing that flows from the throne of God in His Son is magnificent and amazing. Our Father is a Father full of great mercy, great love. He pours out His grace upon us, all because of His beloved Son.
So let’s praise the Lord.
Heavenly Father, I do pray that we would come to realize more and more the greatness of Your love for Your Son—how great the Father’s love for His Son is—and how great the Father’s love for us is.
Lord, it is vast beyond all measure. I want to pray that You would fill our hearts with a celebratory praise, a blessing of our Heavenly Father, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Bless Your name, Lord. Amen.
These words were read this morning from Ezekiel, but I want to leave them again.