Ephesians 4:7-11

So let's start by reading this text.

Apostle Paul writes in verse 7, "But to each

one of us grace was given according to the

measure of Christ's gift; therefore it says,

when he ascended on high, he led captive,

a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men."

Now this expression, he ascended, what does it

mean except that he also has descended

into the lower parts of the earth?

He who descended is himself also he who asc

ended far above all the heavens so that he

might

fill all things.

And he gave some as apostles and some as

pastors and some as evangelists and some as

pastors

and teachers.

Now that'll be where we'll stop for today

because as you're going to see, that'll be

all we need to look at as far as our text.

Now you know this, the New Testament is really

pretty evenly divided between, on the one

hand, what we are to do for Christ by living

in obedience to His Word.

There are lots of – and we've been seeing

this in chapter 4 so far – lots of

indicative

exhortations, commands that demonstrate to us,

a lot of that by the Apostle Paul, how

we are to live the Christian life in a way

that's pleasing to God.

So there's pretty – the other side, of

course, pretty divided what Christ has done

for us is the other side of that.

And there are many things that Christ has done

for His people that we don't even have

anything to do with, right?

Think about it.

So we could say that Christianity is not just

what we do for God.

Much more than that, it is a response to what

God in Christ has done for us.

And that gets right to the very core of the

Gospel.

And at the core of the Gospel, when we drill

down into the Gospel, what we are always going

to find right there at the core is the word

grace.

Note, where you find that here in our text,

starting in verse 7.

But to each one of us, grace was given.

The first word of the definition of

Christianity as a whole should always be grace

.

Obedience in the Christian life comes after

grace has been granted and in response to

grace from God, but grace alone by itself,

that's all of God, 1000%.

And as you know with grace, He initiates grace

in our lives.

He extends grace first so that more than

anything else, again, biblical Christianity

can be

defined if you had to just put an overarching

phrase, "God's grace."

The Bible knows a whole lot more about giving

than getting, right?

Because it's God's nature to give.

What did Jesus say?

It is more blessed to what?

Give than to receive.

And grace, by definition, it's an act of

giving.

Use no grace unless it acts in giving.

Look again at verse 7.

But to each one of us, grace was given

according to the measure of Christ's gift.

So grace gives and it gives in a measure that

is unmerited, undeserved, unlearned and free.

Grace is not something that is dependent on

the receiver of it.

Grace is only dependent upon the giver of it.

And in the big picture understanding, God's

grace is a self-donation given by Him.

It's not an object that He gives that is

important.

That's what it is.

It is Himself that He gives to us.

God's grace is God giving Himself to undes

erving sinners like all of us.

God so loved the world that He, what, gave His

only begotten Son.

Why is that an act of self-giving?

Because Jesus said if you see Me, you've seen

the Father, right?

I and the Father are one.

So God gave Himself in giving Christ.

He is the way, remember He said, that replaces

our lostness.

He is the truth that replaces our ignorance

and He is the life that replaces our spiritual

deadness.

What do you tell the woman at the well?

I am the living water.

If you drink this water, you'll never thirst

again.

So it's always self-donation with God.

It's always self-giving with Christ.

Look at 2 Corinthians chapter 8 and verse 9, "

For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus

Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your

sake He became poor, so that you through His

poverty might become rich."

So God emptied Himself in Christ in order to

make all of us undeserving sinners rich,

not with money, but with eternal riches, the

riches that count.

And over and over and over, we see in the New

Testament these examples of God's giving.

And that's again what we see here in verse 7.

Look at it again of our text, "But to each one

of us, grace was given according to the

measure of Christ's gifts."

Now let me tell you just a brief word about

this whole text that we're looking at that

I just read when we started out.

We are going to see the gifts of Christ to the

individual believer.

And then in the middle of this text, in verses

8 to 10, we are going to see from Paul how

it is that Christ has the right to give these

gifts.

And then at the back end of this text, it's

going to be the gifts of Christ to the total

church, to the church in general.

So let's start with the gifts to the

individual believer.

Again, verse 7, "But to each one of us," that

's Christians.

There's no Christian that's left out here.

There is no such thing as a non-gifted

believer.

This is repeated in Romans 12, 1 Corinthians

12, "To each one of us, grace ends given."

And that's because it's always grace, right,

that we would ever get anything from God.

Gift or salvation or otherwise.

I quoted R.C. Sproul last time.

As soon as you start talking about deserving

mercy or God owing you mercy or grace, you're

not talking about mercy or grace anymore.

By definition, both are undeserved.

And then Paul says grace was given according

to the measure of Christ's gift.

And it's interesting, the Greek word for

measure here has to do with quantity.

To each one of us, we have been given a

measured out gift, a certain quantity, a

certain definition.

And in this sense, it's singular because

notice what it says, gift.

It says gift.

Now, theologians, commentators, squabble about

all this, but we don't need to squabble.

It's pretty simple to me, gift, but at the

same time, as it says singular gift, we know

that there are many areas or aspects of that

same giftedness.

Look at Romans 12, 6.

Romans 12, 6.

Notice we have gifts that differ according to

the, there's that word again, grace given

to us.

Each one of us is to exercise them accordingly

.

And then if you keep reading in that text, he

gives you some examples of these gifts.

Notice again, these are grace gifts.

You don't earn them.

They're freely given by God.

1 Corinthians 12, verse 4.

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same

spirit, the Holy Spirit.

And then of course, we get the great example

of the church being one body made up of many

members.

Look there at 1 Corinthians 12, verse 12, for

even as the body is one and yet has many

members and all the members of the body,

though they are many or one body, so also is

Christ.

And he goes on to explain there in that text

how we are one body of Christ made up of many

members and the human body is the perfect

example.

All the members of our human body operating in

different ways to make up one functioning

body.

That's the perfect illustration for the body

of Christ.

That is how God designed the church to operate

.

Our bodies are feet, hands.

Everything does something different, brain.

Everything's doing something different, but it

all comes together to make up one functioning

body.

So this means we have all individually been

given a gift when you come to faith in Christ

and we can have different levels and

categories and aspects of forgiveness of gifts

that we're

supposed to exercise in serving to make the

body of Christ function properly in the world.

Some examples preaching, teaching, serving,

exhortation, praying, encouragement, giving,

mercy.

I mean we can go down a long list, but again,

first Corinthians 12, 4, there are varieties

of gifts with the same spirit and then first

Corinthians 12, 11, but one in the same spirit

works all these things distributing to each

one individually, just as he wills.

That's every single Christian comes under that

.

So it's the spirit's work to give out these

gifts and guess what?

Every Christian is like a snowflake.

There are no two Christians exactly, precisely

alike when it comes to giftedness.

Listen, some people have the same gifts, no.

If God can do that with fingerprints and God

can do that with DNA and God can do that

with snowflakes, there's no two alike and He

can do it with us and He has in the way

that each one of us have been uniquely gifted

to serve in His church and He blends us all

together in exercising these gifts to make up

one functioning church in the world, but

we get a problem in this situation.

We get dysfunctional when people in the church

want to make Christianity a spectator sport.

What do I mean by that?

Well, they just show up to watch it happen.

Serve me.

Okay.

Thank you.

I'm going home.

When each individual Christian does not do

what God has enabled you to do and gifted to

you to do, when you don't exercise those gifts

, that, folks, is when the church is not able

to function in the way that God has designed

it to work.

If you want to bring glory to God with your

life, and if you're a Christian, that should

be your purpose in life above everything else,

it starts with you exercising this giftedness

that He is giving you, starts in your church,

ministering to one another, and then it r

ipples

out from there, praying for one another.

We do a great job of that here at Providence,

don't we, encouraging one another, serving

one another, helping one another in whatever

is needed when somebody needs help.

Each one of us has our own unique, individual

giftedness to contribute to the body of Christ

.

If I have something mechanical happen at my

house, you can forget about it with me.

It's got to be either Jordan, especially techn

ologically, it's got to be Jordan and her

giftedness to

fix TVs and Internet and all of that, or

something else I got to call a brother and say

, "Hey,

come help me."

It's just one example.

But after presenting this idea of individual

giftedness in verse 7, Paul wants to go on

to talk about the general gift that are given

in the church.

But before he does that, he stops.

And he does what we've seen earlier in Ephes

ians, he does like a parenthesis in between

individual

gifts and gifts given in general to the church

.

And in so doing, next, he's going to quote

Psalm 6818.

And let me give you the overview.

The point here, the biggest point is he's

showing us why it is that Christ had the right

as Jesus to give these gifts that we're fixing

to look at.

Look at verse 8, "Therefore it says, when he

ascended on high, he led captive a host

of captives, and he gave gifts to men."

That is a direct quote from Psalm 6818.

Now if you study Psalm 68, you will find that

it is a victory hymn composed by David to

celebrate God's conquest of what at that time

was the Jesuit city of Jerusalem.

And what you will further find if you go home

and study that Psalm tonight is really it's

a picture of God as a conquering hero.

So as the Psalm starts out, God sets out to

make war with his enemies.

And God wins, of course, because he's God.

He goes out to war and he's victorious.

And he comes back and it shows God, as it were

, verse 18, "ascending the hill of victory."

And he's got the spoils of victory with him,

and he's got the captives with him.

That's the picture.

And Paul, use of this here in Ephesians, tells

us that this is also a prophecy of Jesus

Christ.

And it's always interesting when you have the

New Testament revealing more depth to what

was originally written in the Old Testament in

a different sense.

And that's what we have here.

It's a picture of the great victory of Jesus

over Satan, sin, death, hell, and the grave,

as we're fixing to see.

Now, to add to this picture, imagine a king of

Israel and go out to the battling wind.

He came back to the city.

He would ascend the hill of Mount Zion, that

famous site in Jerusalem.

And behind him, there'd be two things.

There'd be the spoils of victory, the riches,

and there would be people.

And there would be slaves from that foreign

nation taken as a spoil.

Sorry, that's just part of history.

Most of history is filled with slavery.

And there would be a second group.

Notice it says here in verse 8 again, "He led

captive a host of captives."

Now with this Israel king, that would be

Israelites who were in prison of the nation

that he had

just conquered.

And he brings them out of that jail.

So the conquering king would have people from

the nation that they had just defeated and

his own people that he freed out of jail, out

of that nation's captivity.

And that picture is what Paul is seeing here

in Christ.

Now, stay with me.

When Jesus died on the cross, it was the most

major paradigm shift, we could say, both in

our world and in the spiritual realm that

there has ever been.

What looked like from the outside looking in

looked like a major loss at Calvary with

Jesus up there bleeding and dying in the most

hideous way ever invented for a human being

to die, crucifixion, was actually the greatest

win in human history, in reality, in the

bigger

picture as holy justice was satisfied in his

substitutionary atonement for all believers.

And again, after the resurrection and the

whole thing is completed, Satan's sin, death,

hell, and the grave are defeated.

Now, let's dig in a little further, and here's

where we get into differences of opinion

between commentators, theologians, pastors, as

to exactly what is going on here.

Okay.

I see Stacy nodding her head.

She knows what I'm fixing to get into.

Now first, instead of giving you all the

different views and keeping you here till 230,

I'm just

going to give you where I am right now

currently with this subject matter.

And I want you to know I am in no way dogmatic

about this.

If you can sit down with me with your Bible

and give me some scriptural evidence as to

why you think your view is more correct than

mine, I'm here for it.

I'm here to be convinced by your argument.

Now, you have to come with your Bible, not

just who you read or what you think, but you

come with your Bible and sit down and say, "No

, brother Philip, I think this means this.

We'll make a pot of coffee and I'll be glad to

hear it.

You might change my mind."

But for now, this is where I'm at, okay?

Here the cross.

Jesus ascended, as it were, the mountain of

victory, as we just talked about.

And behind him, he led captive, a host of capt

ives.

Other translations say he led captivity

captive.

That's Paul's idea here.

And let's just follow these next two verses to

see just what exactly Paul is meaning here.

Jesus comes back with these spoils and in this

situation it's gifts to give and captives.

Now Paul wants to explain who this is.

Who is this psalmist talking about?

Verse 9, now this expression, he ascended,

what does it mean that he also had descended

into the lower parts of the earth?

What is that?

That's quite a phrase, right?

So but notice first, the one who ascended in

verse 8, Paul is telling us in verse 9, this

same one also descended into the lower parts

of the earth.

Verse 10, he who descended is himself, also he

who ascended far above all the heavens

so that he may might fill all things.

Now you already know who this is, but just to

give you a biblical example, who is he

that fills all things, well we learned that

back in Ephesians 1, verse 23, which is his

body, the fullness of him who fills all and

all and in context to his that Ephesians 1,

20, which he brought about in Christ, okay?

So clearly we're talking about Jesus here.

Verse 8, and back in our text, he ascended,

verse 9, he ascended, verse 10, we find the

phrase, he ascended.

And you remember in Acts 1, what happened

after the resurrection, Jesus has the apostles

around him and he ascended into heaven and a

cloud received him out of their sight.

So Paul is saying, I believe, Christ is the

one who won the victory, brought the spoils,

that's the gifts, and led the captives free.

Now let's get to the nitty-gritty, alright?

Who are the captives?

Well, I'm going to present a case using some

other scriptures to tell you who I think these

captives are, alright?

So we're going to go over to 1 Peter, chapter

3, verse 18, starting in verse 18, "For Christ

also died for sins, once for all, the just for

the unjust, so that he might bring us

to God," now watch, this is the key phrase, "h

aving been put to death in the flesh, but

made alive in the Spirit."

So simply put, it's this, when Jesus was

crucified, he was put to death, he was dead in

the flesh,

but he was still alive in the Spirit, his

outer man died, his inner man was alive, that

's

just like us, just like us when we die, he

never lost consciousness when he died, okay?

His Spirit was still, all systems go, same as

us when we die, and have you ever asked

a question, where was Jesus for the three days

when his body was in the grave, you ever

thought about that?

He had not yet ascended to his Father,

remember, lots of people have wrestled down

through

church history with the text that refer to

this subject matter and have come up with

some very different conclusions from one

another, and again I'm just going to give you

where

I am on this particular subject right now

today in 2025, I am subject to change, and

I will let you know if I do, but right now

this is where I am.

I think where Jesus was in those three days,

or part of where he was, was descending to

the lower parts of the earth, as it says here

in our text.

Notice the end of verse 18 in verse Peter

chapter 3, okay, first, "but made alive in

the Spirit," that's the end of 18, and then we

go into 19, "in which," alright now notice,

"in which" modifies the word Spirit, "made

alive in the Spirit, in which in his Spirit

also he went and made proclamation to the Spir

its now in prison," whoa!

What in the world is that?

Spirits in prison, look, you got to deal with

what it's saying here.

Spirits now in prison clearly can't be guys in

Angola.

They have Spirits, but that's clearly not what

he's referring to here.

Now, let me give you a summary statement of my

view here.

During the Old Testament times, from the

Hebrew, the place of the dead was known as H

ades,

or shield.

We're not talking about hell in the final hell

, we find that in the book of Revelation,

the Lake of Fire, Hades is cast into the Lake

of Fire, that's the final, final hell, Lake

of Fire.

But things were different, I believe, with

where the dead went before the cross, before

Jesus' substitutionary atoning sacrifice, and

here's how I think this might help you

to understand this.

Imagine I draw a picture of a circle for you

right here, and now what I'm going to do is

I'm going to draw a line straight across the

middle of the circle like this, so here's

your circle, and right in the middle there's a

line.

And imagine in your circle, with the line

going across the middle, there's an upper

section, if you will, of this circle where the

believing righteous dead went when they

died.

Their Spirits went there in Hades, Hades is

the circle, after they died.

The lower part in the circle of Hades, the

whole thing is Hades, is where the unbelieving

unrighteous dead went in Hades after they died

.

And also down in the lower part of Hades were

these bound demons that we're fixing to talk

about in just a minute.

Now hold that thought for just a second, and

let me just get a quick review, Hades, Sheol,

face of the dead, that's how it's defined,

okay, in Scripture, that's where all the dead

people's spirits went when they died, upper

half believers, she's referred to as paradise.

Not no bad stuff happening there, no judgment

happening there, but not yet heaven in the

full presence of God, lower half of Hades,

unbelievers, unrighteous, and also in this

lower half of Hades, this certain group of

bound fallen angels, demons.

There's two kind of fallen angels, there's

ones that are running around loose, wreaking

havoc, can't possess a believer because the

Holy Spirit indwells us, but can possess unbel

ievers,

we see that in Scripture and wreaking havoc in

people's lives and in the church and all

the rest.

But there's also some bound demons, we find

them in several Scriptures, they are in a

prison, they are in a pit, we see that in the

book of Revelation, the abyss, the bottomless

pit, different names, how did they get there?

Well, here's where it's fixing to really get

juicy, okay, verse 19, let's go back to that

in Peter, in which also he, Jesus, went and

made proclamation to the spirits now in prison

,

who are they?

Peter, well he tells you, these spirits now in

prison, verse 20, who were once disobedient.

We found out, that's what they were, when the

patience of God kept waiting, that's when

it happened, their disobedience in the days of

Noah, during the construction of the ark,

in which a few, that is eight, persons were

brought safely through the water.

Now just a plain reading of that, what do you

have?

We've got some disobedient spirits, who were

disobedient, now they're in prison and when

were they disobedient?

They were disobedient during the days of Noah,

everybody with me so far, okay, this is what

I think this is, this right here, Genesis 6 is

the days of Noah, Genesis 6, 1 and 2.

Now it came about when men began to multiply

on the face of the land and daughters were

born to them, that the sons of God, and that

phrase in almost every case in the Old

Testament

is referring to angels, sons of God, there's a

couple places where it's not, but most

of the places is referring to angels, saw that

the daughters of men were beautiful and

they took wives for themselves, whomever they

chose, now here's where it gets wild, we're

getting into some high strangeness right now,

I think, and I'm fixing to show you this verse

,

that these fallen angels, I don't know how, I

can't answer that, but I think in some way

they cohabitated with these daughters of men

and they produced this hybrid race, and I'll

show you this, look at chapter 6 of Genesis in

verse 4, the Nephilim were on the earth

in those days, that's a different group, and

also after, and we have to talk about that

one later, afterward when the sons of God,

same phrase, I believe it's fallen angels,

came into the daughters of men and they bore

children to them, and it goes on to describe

these children, these were the mighty men, men

who were of old, men of renown, now there's

two basic views here that's happened, some

believe, and this is my position, but these

are actual fallen angels who produced this

hybrid race during the time and the days of

Noah, alright, there are other views, another

major view is called the line of Seth, inter

married

with the line of Cain and produced this

problem, it's purely a human understanding of

human

beings and the sons of God are referring to

actual just human beings and not demons here,

that's another view and I won't go all through

that, but let's go back to where I am, actual

demons, how, I can't answer that because it

doesn't give it that in scripture, this is

John MacArthur's view and he would refer to

the products of this unholy union as a bunch

of Rosemary's babies running around on the

earth, if you're familiar with that creepy

old movie from the 70s, Rosemary's Baby, if

not don't watch it, it's terrible, I'm telling

you, but this is why, and I've often thought

of this, you think about the people of our

day, I mean how much more wicked could the

people of Noah's day been than the people

of our day, well, I think the reason for the

major wickedness that made God destroy the

whole world with a flood is primarily to wipe

out the race of these hybrids and all the

wickedness

that they were doing on the earth to just

completely wipe them out along with all the

wickedness that they had really stirred up the

human beings to do, and then God, I believe

and I'm going to show you, I'm going to give

you biblical evidence to make my case, I'm

fixing to show you, I believe that God

uniquely punished these particular demons who

didn't

keep, as the old King James says, their first

estate, but went past their boundaries of

what they were supposed to do by putting them

into this pit, this prison, this abyss, I

think

that is who, go back to 1 Peter 3 19, I think

that is who Peter is calling these spirits

now in prison that Jesus went and made pro

clamation to, okay, who, next verse, verse 20,

who these

spirits in prison were once disobedience, when

, when the patience of God kept waiting

in the days of Noah, there it is right there,

Genesis says Noah preached for 120 years

while the ark was being built, and at the same

time that was happening, I believe what

this is saying is that these was when these

demons were running riot throughout the earth,

stirring up the wickedness in the people and

overstepping these boundaries that God had

set for them in this vile, vile disobedience

to God, and I think Peter refers to this in

another verse, look with me now, in two verses

actually, look over at 2 Peter chapter 2,

verses 4 and 5, notice this, for if God did

not spare the angels when they sinned, now

that can't be holy angels can it, oh, gotta be

fallen angels, for if God did not spare

the angels when they sinned, but cast them

into hell, now you have to know the Greek

here, it's interesting, Peter borrows from

actually Greek culture because the Greek

word for hell there is taurus, and the Greeks

taught that taurus was the very lowest place

in Hades, but keep going in this verse, cast

them into hell and committed them to pits

of darkness reserved for judgment, and guess

what comes in the very next verse, he refers

to Noah again and did not spare the ancient

world, but preserved Noah a preacher of

righteousness

with seven others when he brought a flood upon

the world of the ungodly, so two times,

when Peter is talking about these angels that

sinned, these spirits now in prison, and they

're

committed to pits of darkness, first Peter

says, spirits in prison at the same time in

both of those texts, he adds to it during the

days of Noah, in the days of Noah, and

I'm not done, I got another verse for you, in

Jude, Jude only has one chapter, so verse

five, look at this, and angels, you're fixing

to see these have to be fallen angels, angels

who did not keep their own domain, but

abandoned their proper abode, he has kept,

here it is

again, in eternal bonds under darkness for the

judgment of the same, of the great day,

so once again, these fallen angels didn't keep

their proper abode, he has put them in

this eternal special judgment of darkness to

the great day, I think all of those verses

are talking about this same subject, it's wild

, I know we're on Mr. Toad's wild ride,

I understand that, but this is a supernatural

book and we live in a supernatural existence,

and now I think that Jesus descended to this

particular place, where these particular

spirits

were put into prison, these fallen angels who

were once disobedient and not keeping

their own domain, but abandoned their proper

abode, impregnating the women of Noah's day,

and they were punished by God by being put

because of their horrendous crime that had

never been done before since in that pit, in

fact, if you remember when Jesus cast the

demons out, and they said, no, don't send us

to the pit, and what did he do, he sent them

into the pigs and they went off to cliff, they

knew about this pit, I think that's talking

about the same thing, but if you keep going,

here's some further evidence, keep going in

verse Peter 3, 22, speaking of Jesus, who is

at the right hand of God, having gone into

heaven after angels and authorities and powers

had been subjected to him, and you remember

from earlier in our study, authorities,

principalities, powers referring to fallen

angels, they're

clearly angels there in that verse too, and so

what did Jesus do when he went down into

this spirits and prison situation, we'll go

back to 1 Peter 3, 19, it says, he went and

made proclamation, now it doesn't tell us

exactly what the proclamation is, but I think

when you put the whole thing together, this is

what I think, I think he went and proclaimed

to those fallen angels that what you guys

thought what looked like was a big defeat

at Calvary actually was the greatest victory

in all of human history, and Paul is referring

to fallen angels and Colossians look at 215

when he says when he had disarmed the rulers

and authorities he made a public display of

them having triumphed over them through him,

I think that that is what Jesus the victor of

death, hell and the grave did when he went

to make this proclamation, now go back to Eph

esians 4, we're going to add to this, I think

on

his way out of that lower part of Hades where

Jesus proclaimed victory to those fallen

angels,

he went through the top part of Hades where

all the believers were go back to Ephesians

4, 8 and he led captive a host of captives, I

think other translations again he led

captivity

captive, these are all these Old Testament

saints, and let me add this again, this part

of Hades is what I believe that Jesus is

referring to in the parable, and I don't think

it's

a story that he made up, I think it really is

true where remember he talks about Abraham's

bosom is where Lazarus was and the rich man

was down and there's a great gulf in between

them in Luke 16, and I think this is referring

to the same Hades if you remember the circle

of Hades because these Old Testament saints

think about it before the cross, they couldn't

enter I don't think into the presence of a

holy God yet because Jesus' blood had not

actually been shed yet, it had not actually,

payment had not actually been made for the

sins of believers, now they believed like

Abraham and it was counted to them as

righteousness,

they received it by faith of what was to come,

but it hadn't come yet, it hadn't happened

yet kind of like on credit in today's terms if

you will, when Jesus died and he actually

made atonement for all who believe, I think he

went into Abraham's bosom and led captivity

captive and brought them to heaven to be in

God's presence, but they had to wait until

Jesus actually purchased their redemption on

the cross, that's the triumph of Calvary,

and when he won that victory, as Hebrews says,

he perfected forever by one offering

them that are sanctified, and he made his pro

clamation to those spirits in prison, he

opened the doors of that upper part of Hades

and released the captives to be in the

presence

of God, and now after the cross all believers,

when we die, we don't go back to that place

because Paul says to be absent with the body

is to be present with who, the Lord, and we

go straight to heaven after Jesus' work has

now been completed, now that was a wild ride,

I had to fill in what captivity captive meant

in order to actually get us to the broader

meaning here of Ephesians 4, alright, because

there's a broader meaning here, but I had

to explain that, you just get, oh, captivity

captive, just skip over that, we got to

explain

it, right, it was Jesus' victory on the cross

and conquering the grave that allowed him

to be the one who had the right to give us

gifts that every single believer has given,

this is why you cannot treat your spiritual

giftedness that you have lightly when you

contemplate the cost that Jesus had to pay for

Christ to be able to grant you that privilege,

the infinite price that he paid cannot take

this subject lightly, Jesus didn't die on

the cross just to save you, Jesus died to

enable you to serve him and to bring him glory

with your life, and guess what, he gives you,

all of us believers, the spiritual giftedness

to be able to do that, now, having made his

point in this parenthesis, next Paul wants

us to know he not only gave gifts to

individual Christians, but also to the total

body of

Christ, remember again from verse 8, he led

captive, a host of captive, and he gave gifts

to men, now, here comes some of the gifts,

verse 11, because we're done with the parenth

esis,

okay, he gave some as apostles and some as

prophets and some as evangelists and some

as pastors and teachers, now, I used up most

of my time with the parenthesis today, so

you're going to have to listen faster and we

'll cover some more this next time when

we get back into this text, Jesus is given

each believer a gift singular that can have

many facets of giftedness and he's given the

whole body of Christ, what we could refer

to as gifted men, first, verse 11, apostles,

are we indebted to the apostles, you better

believe it, they wrote the New Testament, we

wouldn't have a New Testament without the

apostles, next says prophets, now, here, and

you can go look at this in Acts, he's

referring

to this special group of men in the early

church who spoke for God, the Word of God,

but we believe that their office ceased with

the apostles and with the completion of the

New Testament, sometimes they spoke in direct

revelation, sometimes they expounded

revelation

already given, this is what Ephesians chapter

2, verse 20 tells us of both of these groups

of men, that they were the foundation of the

church, this is two special groups of men,

where it says having been built on the

foundation of the apostles and the prophets,

that's the

two groups we're referring to here, Christ

Jesus himself being the cornerstone, okay,

and then next in Ephesians 4, verse 11, it

says evangelist and some as pastors and

teachers

and there are people who debate whether

evangelist is an office and all of that, but

let me tell

you, simply put, this is my view, God has been

so good to his people to give gifted

men evangelists, men who proclaim the good

news of the gospel to unbelievers and

immediately

who comes to my mind is Ed Lacy.

Ed Lacy, just how much his evangelistic

ministry meant to me and countless others

around this

whole globe and think about it, his ministry

continues on years after his death, that's

how much of an impact this one man made with

his evangelistic ministry and then next you

see here in verse 11, some pastors and

teachers, now without a big boondoggle

explanation,

basically in context, this is understood as a

single office of leadership, pastors and

teachers is basically you put that together as

teaching shepherd, teaching shepherd, that's

synonymous with elder, bishop or overseer,

pastor, and all down through church history

we can think of some really very uniquely,

especially gifted men who have served in this

role and have made a worldwide impact, men

like the reformers, Luther, Calvin, Knox,

later Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Jonathan

Edwards, these men wrote books and preached

sermons

that are still being published today in 2025,

can you imagine having such an influence and

impact on the world that centuries later your

works are still being published and then think

about in our day who we looked at again in

Sunday school this morning, R.C.

Sproul, now he's in heaven and the impact of

his ministry as a pastor, he finished up

as a pastor, still happening today, long after

he's died, I get the little newsletter from

Ligonier and all the different languages that

their materials are published in, it's

incredible,

and then John MacArthur still in his 80s,

still preaching, pray for him, he's in the

hospital

right now, he's had three major surgeries with

his heart and lungs last year and he's back in

there right now with complications, but he

just preached a couple of weeks ago at Grace

Community,

think of the extraordinary ability that God

had given men like this to expound the word of

God

to the point of worldwide impact and then

there's the countless nameless men who have

faithfully

served as teaching shepherds all over the

world who will never be known much outside of

their own

church, but they're doing the same work,

serving the Lord with the gifts that Christ

has given,

got one right there, Pastor Brother Earl right

there and with our visiting us today, so

remember

now where we started, I'm going to wrap up

with this, remember where we started in

chapter 4 and

verse 1, Paul remember he implores us, that

word is literally begs us to walk worthy of

the calling

with which we have been called, remember it's

a walk of humility, it's a walk of unity,

what we learned today about this walk because

we're still in that primary context is that it

is a walk where you recognize the resources

that you have with the spiritual giftedness

that God has given you and you recognize the

ministries of gifted men that God has given

to the whole church, so don't look at

Christianity as something just that you do for

God, that's

complete legalism, understand it's what God

has done for you and all of the doing that we

do on

our end is simply a response to what he has

done for us in Christ and how could we want to

do any

other but to give our lives to serving him

with a great miracle of grace that he has

extended

to us, well that was a wild ride, I understand

that, if you got questions about that you know

where to get me, hit me up, if you got a

different opinion on that and you studied that

and you want

to convince me of your position, I'll be glad

to hear it, but one thing we won't do is argue

with us and fight about it, we'll just talk

about it and as I tell you all the time you've

got the

right to be wrong, okay, right, all right let

's pray together. Lord we thank you for this

day,

I thank you for Lord this beautiful Sunday,

every Sunday is beautiful because it's your

day

and Lord there are things as as Peter instead

of Paul, things with Paul is just hard to

understand

and certainly we get into these areas where it

's not a crystal clear clarity

with text like we have in justification and

the gospel and things that we absolutely must

believe

in order to be Christians, but there's room

for us to have disagreements and work our way,

this is why you have this I believe, you want

us to dig into these texts to understand this

magnificent word Lord, if there's any error

with anything I've said today Lord, I pray you

forgive me because you know my heart and you

know my motive Lord and I just thank you for

this

wonderful Sunday and we pray that every ounce

of everything that we have done this day has

been

done in such a way as to bring you glory. In

Jesus name we pray. Amen.