In Christ

ByJim Stephens

Welcome to Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus! As I mentioned in September when we completed our devotional reading through Luke’s Gospel and his subsequent account of the “Acts” of the apostles in those early days of the church, we’re spending the rest of our devotional year 2026 in the writings of some of the primary characters from Luke’s Book of Acts. So far we’ve read James’s book, Peter’s two letters, and we’re planning to spend the remainder of the year in some of Paul’s letters to churches and individuals. We’ve finished Galatians and now we’ll read Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians and Thessalonians. Then we’ll look at Paul’s letters to individuals – Timothy, Titus, and Philemon. We’re going to miss out on the letters to the Corinthians and the Romans primarily because there aren’t enough days left in the year to do those. Perhaps we’ll dig into those another year. Grace to you as we continue together through the remainder of 2026.

Scripture: Ephesians 1

3 All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ. 4 Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. 5 God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure. (Ephesians 1:3–5 NLT)

It’s all about Jesus Christ. In this introductory section of Ephesians 1, Paul simply overflows with the reality of who we are and what we have in Christ. He uses the phrases “with Christ”, “through Christ”, “in Christ”, “of Christ”, “belong to Christ”, “because of Christ”, “trust in Christ”, “believe in Christ”, “authority of Christ”, and “filled by Christ”, all in this one short chapter.

It’s not about self-effort, keeping all the rules, working a little harder, denying self a little more.

  • It’s simply about who Jesus Christ is and who we are in him.
  • It’s about what he has done and what we have in him.
  • It’s about simple faith and trust in Jesus Christ.

Prayer:

Father, Thank you for loving us and for sending your son Jesus Christ to be who we couldn’t be so we can become who you want us to be in him. Thank you for sending Jesus Christ to do what we could not do so we can be forgiven and adopted into your family. Thank you that it’s all in Christ. Amen.