“In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.”
—Ephesians 1:13-14
TO TRUST in Christ means you have been personally and savingly united to Christ by true faith, which the Holy Spirit worked in you. You don’t trust Christ because of something you do, but only because of the work of the Holy Spirit, who regenerates the heart and creates faith to trust in Christ. And being a member of a church doesn’t necessarily mean you are trusting in Christ. So how do you know if you are trusting in Christ? Well, do you trust Him alone for the salvation of your soul? Do you believe that apart from the person and work of Christ you have no hope of being reconciled to God? Do you believe that Jesus died for your sins and imputed His righteousness to you, and that you have no righteousness of yourself? Do you delight in hearing Christ, and do you strive to obey His commandments? Do you have any love in your heart for Christ? None of this is perfect in this life, but is there evidence of these things in your life?
YOU COULDN’T truly believe and do these things unless the Holy Spirit has worked true faith in you and shed the love of God abroad in your heart. The Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 8:7, “Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be.” And we read in Ephesians 2:4-5, “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).” Therefore, everyone who has truly heard the Gospel and trusts Christ who speaks through the Word of God has been spiritually united to Christ and is engrafted into Him just like a branch united to a vine.
AND PAUL makes it clear in our text that once a person trusts in Christ they can never be lost. “In whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.” Once a person believes in Christ they are eternally sealed by the Holy Spirit and can never fully or finally fall away from the Faith that “was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude vs. 3).
THE HOLY SPIRIT is the seal and mark of ownership that Paul refers to. Just as a farmer marks his sheep, which indicates ownership, in the same way, Paul says that the Holy Spirit has been given to us as the mark of God’s ownership! And knowing we are owned by God produces assurance of salvation. The very purpose of being sealed with the Holy Spirit is that we might be assured that God’s promises to us will come to pass in God’s time. And this happens as the Holy Spirit produces assurance by bearing witness with our spirit through the Word of God that we are God’s children (Romans 8:16).
DO YOU know the witness of the Spirit? Do you know that you are a child of God? Then praise the Lord for the work of the Holy Spirit in your soul as He creates faith, enables us to believe, pours God’s love into our heart, and bears an infallible witness through the Word into our heart that we belong to Christ!
Tuesday Encouragement: April 23, 2024
In Christ,
Pastor S. Henry
