Got the Lockdown Blues?

Got the Lockdown Blues?

Ephesians 2:7

The Lockdown has been a shock to us all.  Businesses have closed, huge retail chains across the word have closed, and will never re-open.  In the space of a couple of weeks, everything that was normal was gone.  I’m just one of many many people whose whole world has changed…. We’ve all been affected to some extent.

So, for the Christian, it may be appropriate to ask, ‘Where is God in this time of plague?’  It was when I was thinking about this that I read Ephesians 2:7.  that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

1 Everything in This Life is Temporary.  There are ‘Ages to Come‘ 

One thing we ought to have learned is that nothing in this world can be depended upon,  As Christians we need to understand the importance of this.  There is a temptation to place too much emphasis on what we have in the way material things, especially in this over-materialistic age.   

People not so many years ago had so very little, yet in their poverty many were content, and family life could be happy, but think how far we have progressed – yet how grateful are we for all that we have, the riches and wealth of this world? How great too the temptation to want to hold on to these things, to make them idols, our little shiny gods, whom we worship with our desires and our attention.  But they are perishing. 1 John 2:16-18   

That’s the point.  This life is not the end, it’s not the purpose of our whole existence.  God does have a plan for us, his plan for us is to bless us in ’the Ages to Come…’

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2 Everything in Christ is Permanent. 

The key to overcoming the Lockdown for Christian believers is to understand that no matter what this life may bring – (and it will bring us loss, and illness and pain and parting and sorrow and death), our focus is not on these things but on Jesus, in whom we have a permanence that endures throughout eternity.  Look again at our verse…

• God’s eternal plan for us is already plotted out.  This verse does not stand alone.  It’s set in one of the most beautiful passages of Scripture – Ephesians chapter two, where Paul speaks of God’s eternal plan of salvation for his own people.   He tells us that while we were still dead in our sins, God purposed our salvation, and ordained that His own Son would pay the price at the cross for the sins of fallen mankind.  And that’s not all, for the ultimate result of God’s gracious intervention on our behalf is eternal life! Ephesians 2:4-7  
• God’s plan for us involves our eternal enrichment.  God’s plan for us is to be rich!  IN HEAVEN!  I’m promised a MANSION! In God’s eternal kingdom we will know a blessedness, an enrichment, that we could never even contemplate in this life!   
• God’s Grace is better than anything we have in this life.  And even if that wasn’t so we are sill blessed because of the grace that God has outpoured on us in this life, in bringing us out of the bondage of sin and misery and shame, and redeeming us, adopting us into God’s family and caring and providing for us!  We are so greatly blessed!   Psalm 63:3   Psalm 103:4  So Paul sings God’s praises: He has loved us with a great love, He has given us New Life, He has raised us up, He has sat us down, He has brought us into heavenly places, He has incorporated us into Christ’s body, the church, He has been kind to us, undeservedly so!  We are blessed by His GRACE! 

And all of that can not and will not change! Romans 8:35-39  

3 The Kindness of God is Demonstrated in Christ. 

Our last thought today, is that everything that is precious in life, and everything that will endure, in this life and in the life to come is because of Jesus. In Him we are saved and in him we have eternal life.   James 1:7  

Let’s get our focus on Jesus.  Let’s get our eyes off the things which are perishing in life, and look forward to what is permanent.   Everything in this world, including the bodies in which we live will pass away, but our heavenly inheritance is for ever!  2 Corinthians 5:1