Ephesians 1:3 says, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.” Then later, Ephesians 1:20-22 says that Christ has risen victoriously from the grave and is now seated at the right hand of the Father in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name as the head of the church for the good of His church and the life of the world. And then in Ephesians 2:5-6 it says that we Christians—the church—have been made alive with Christ and seated with Him in the heavenly places.
Through His life, death, and resurrection, Jesus has shown Himself to be the new and true better Adam. He is the true human, the true man that Adam and all of humanity have failed to be. But, after succeeding where we have failed, suffering and dying for our failure, and then rising in victory, Jesus ascended to the right hand of the Father where He rules, reigns, and ever intercedes for us. And the reality of Jesus’ victorious presence, rule, and reign in the heavenly places has a massive effect on our lives right now. That’s what Ephesians is getting at when it says that we are seated in the heavenly places with Him and are blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
Throughout the whole book of Ephesians Paul calls Christians to live out their identity in Christ. He calls us to be who we are in Christ Jesus. And the reason he does that is because now we can. We have been blessed with every spiritual blessing in Christ. That means that by the power of the Holy Spirit we can actually know Christ, love Christ, follow Christ, and become more and more like Christ. And at the heart of what that means is becoming and being more and more human, and doing what humanity was always meant to do.
In Genesis God called Adam and his household to the original Creation/Cultural Mandate, meaning to be and do what humans created in God’s image were meant to be and do. They were to trust and obey, to tend and keep what is true, good, and beautiful, to be fruitful and multiply, and subdue the earth and have dominion over it. Essentially, through faith, family, and industry, they were to develop and cultivate culture that glorifies God and advance it throughout the earth. And what I’m getting at, is that now, in Christ, we can and we must do that. In fact, in Christ, we are given a New Creation/Cultural Mandate, in the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20). There Jesus commands us to disciple the nations, and a major part of how we do that is by developing culture that glorifies God through the ordinary means of grace—reading/studying God’s Word, preaching/teaching God’s Word, singing and praying God’s Word, and the right practice of the sacraments with God’s people—and by living every aspect of our lives intentionally for the glory of Christ, and spreading it to the ends of the earth, slowly but surely bringing every domain of human existence under joyful submission to the Lordship of Christ.
In places like Deuteronomy 6, Ephesians 6, and elsewhere, God commands parents to give their children a Christian education, raising them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. The word for nurture in the Greek in Ephesians 6:4 is παιδεία (paideia), which can also be translated as culture. And that makes sense, given that education is a great way to build culture. So, literally what Ephesians 6:4 calls us to is to not merely teach our kids some Christian things, but to give them a thorough Christian education, showing them that all things, including every subject and every part of life, are from Jesus, for Jesus, and to Jesus; and to bring them up in the very culture of Christ, where we seek to glorify Him in all things. We are to teach them the ins and outs of the Law and Gospel, and the whole of God’s Word. We are to teach them God’s Word from Genesis to Revelation. And we aren’t just to teach them to know it, but to observe it—that is, to live in light of it and in obedience to Christ in every area of life for the glory of Christ.
Every Christian home is to have a Christian culture about it, and we are to seek to take the Christian culture that we establish in our homes and churches and spread them out to the ends of the earth. We are to bring every area of life—family, education, business, politics, law, medicine, art, recreation, and every lawful vocation, etc—under the Lordship of Christ. And you see, this is something we can do now because we have every spiritual blessing in Christ. Again, that means that by the power of the Holy Spirit we can actually know Christ, love Christ, follow Christ, and become more and more like Christ. And at the heart of what that means is becoming and being more and more human, and doing what humanity was always meant to do.
Spiritual blessings are not something far off and ineffective in the physical world. Just consider what the fruit of the Spirit are and what they do. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires” (Galatians 5:22-24). Because of our spiritual blessings in Christ we can actually love God and love people. I mean, the whole list of fruit is a list of extremely practical things that play out in every area of our daily lives, working for our good, the good of others, and the glory of God. It’s not a list of how to merely pray better, study the Bible better, or some other act of piety. It’s a list that directly effects how we live in the world, giving us the ability to truly take dominion, even dominion over ourselves.
So, beloved, may we seek to live out who we are in Christ, so that we can truly trust and obey in the church, in our homes, and in the world, and slowly but surely, through our everyday lives—marked by love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control—bring every domain of human existence under joyful submission to the Lordship of Christ. If we are in Christ we can do this. So may we get to it.
In Christ’s service and yours,
Nick Esch