SUPPORT GSPS |
The Gold, Silver, Precious Stones team appreciates your contributions in support of this work. Please send your correspondence to:
Gold, Silver, Precious Stones
P.O. Box 240
Harvest, AL 35749
|
|
|
|
Notes on Ephesians Chapter One
AUTHOR: | Oliphant, James H. |
|
5. Having predestinated us to the adoption of children, by Jesus Christ to Himself. Paul was not afraid of the doctrine of predestination. He esteemed it as the ground of a sinner’s hope---the guarantee of a certain redemption. The adoption of Jesus Christ to himself---the Father---is but manifesting in time, what God purposed in eternity. Men fix their minds on certain individuals to inherit their estates, and seek to arrange infallibly the accomplishment of their wishes; so God chose a people before the foundation of the world in Christ Jesus, and in him, and by him, established for them every spiritual good. "Every good gift, is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights." By reason of God’s predestination, the "adoption of children" is secured to them, and by adoption is here meant the work of regeneration or bringing in among his children, as the word here signifies. "Delivered from the power of darkness and translated into the kingdom of God’s dear Son." Individuals receive not only the adoption, but the Spirit of it, whereby they cry "Abba, Father." The Christian loves God as a Father, and draws near to him as a child. Dr. Gill and others, speak of adoption as in some sense eternal, which perhaps is true, as God’s purpose to adopt is itself adoption, but here it seems to me, is intended the act God in bringing men into his own family by regeneration. According to the good pleasure of his will. The world has long sought to find a reason in man why he should be saved, and system after system has been devised to subvert or supercede God’s sovereignty, but the skill of man has fallen short of the task, and while God’s word remains, and he continues to reveal himself in our hearts as the hope of glory, they must forever fail. The apostle here gives the standard by which God works, "According to the good pleasure of his will." Should not this put to silence all who speak of human merit or the work of man in accomplishing salvation? It agrees with the experience of God’s children in every age. Each one is made to know and feel himself as utterly unworthy of salvation, and the Bible presents many instances where (apparently) the worst of men realized the adoption of children, as the thief at the cross, the woman at the well of Samaria, Mary Magdalene, Saul of Tarsus, and many others.
|
|
