EVERY SPIRITUAL BLESSING

“BLESSED be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has BLESSED us with EVERY SPIRITUAL BLESSING in the heavenly places in Christ” – Ephesians 1:3

God has already blessed His people with “EVERY SPIRITUAL BLESSING in the heavenly places in Christ” (Eph.1:3b). It is usual to forget that these spiritual blessings are the greatest blessings of all because they are not so easily visible or tangible, especially in this age of extreme humanism and materiality. In our modern apathetic and pagan cultures, true spirituality is being pushed to the fringes, and spiritual blessings are being considered irrelevant in some climes. Such was the vile spiritual condition of Ephesus, that Paul began his letter by exalting the Living God – “Blessed be the God and Father…” (v.3a). The apostle pointedly countered the “spirit” of the age by reflecting on the greatness of God. He then began to proclaim what the Lord has done for His people: endowed us “with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” – all of which flow to us from the Father and His Son Jesus Christ!

The Christian Life is indeed saturated with blessings that are both SPIRITUAL and “in the heavenly places”!

First, God’s greatest blessings are SPIRITUAL, not material. A huge salary, a billionaire’s lifestyle, beauty, brilliance, fame, fortune, prosperity, popularity, health, and long life; all of these are good and desirable, but nowhere comparable to spiritual blessings. All such material blessings are meant to be additional to the real blessings of God’s kingdom and righteousness: ““But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you” (Mt.6:33). The Christian is promised EVERY spiritual blessing. Besides inferring “non-material,” the word ‘spiritual’ actually means: “of or from, the Holy Spirit”! In essence, we have been blessed with every blessing that pertains to or belongs to God the Spirit. By the Spirit we are convicted of sin, quickened from the dead, and given life. By the Spirit of illumination spiritual blindness is removed from our hearts, that we may appreciate the glories of Jesus the Son of God. By the strength of the Spirit we live by faith, hope, and love; and walk in wisdom, purity and power!

Secondly, God has blessed us in the HEAVENLY places or heavenly realms. This phrase is found only in the epistle to the Ephesians, but occurs five times in this letter! It basically means the real world of God’s creation which is ruled over by the Lord from heaven with all His angelic hosts, and is opposed by the principalities and powers of darkness. Individuals without Christ don’t know that world. They live in a highly limited and restricted world, like someone who had never once gone outside the boundaries of his rural village. Salvation translates us from a narrow realm of ignorance to the boundless realms of reality and truth – the real heavenly realms! Any world view which excludes the heavenly realms where God lives, speaks, and acts, is a constricted and restricted world of darkness.

Non-Christians are blessed by God’s common grace, but all their blessings come short of being blessed in the heavenly places. They may experience the blessings of families, children, prosperity, travel safety, career success, long life, and peace in their nations. Although those are not paltry blessings, and we do see how people strive to be satisfied with them, but they are all blessings apart from the heavenly realms. Multitudes have lived exclusively in their little earthly realm, but alas, it is a restless place which cannot satisfy. God has made us for Himself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Him! In the earthly realm, people gain some of the things that the world offers but lose their souls, children give their parents pain, and money can’t buy happiness or health.

Praise God! We who live in the heavenly realms know reality, a loving Saviour in control, working all things for our good and His Glory, sustaining us with strength and hope day-by-day. We who have entered the heavenly realms have the blessings of knowledge, wisdom, truth, and righteousness. That is eternal life, to be blessed in the heavenly realms!