The Promise

(Story of lady willing money to the church. Church built scholarship fund. Students benefitted from an inheritance of someone they never knew)

(Story of mom giving me money after on of her siblings passed away)

We have all benefitted from someone else's blessing.

Ephesians 1:12–14 NLT

God’s purpose was that we Jews who were the first to trust in Christ would bring praise and glory to God. And now you Gentiles have also heard the truth, the Good News that God saves you. And when you believed in Christ, he identified you as his own by giving you the Holy Spirit, whom he promised long ago. The Spirit is God’s guarantee that he will give us the inheritance he promised and that he has purchased us to be his own people. He did this so we would praise and glorify him.

Jesus was born into the nation of Israel, God’s chosen people to show the world His grace, mercy, and love. They didn’t always do a great job at it, but God’s faithfulness is based on who He is, not us. Thank You Jesus.

Because of this, Israel, the Jews, had first shot at salvation. All those not of jewish heritage, are considered gentiles. We gentiles are also graphed into this family when we accept the free gift of salvation through Jesus. Here Paul is reminding us that we are all children of God. And as children, we receive an inheritance. Because God is so good, He gives us a promise, THE PROMISE, of this inheritance that we are getting. This poses 2 questions.

What, or more precisely, who is the Holy Spirit?

What is this inheritance?

Well, those are 2 big questions.

Inheritance- a financial term describing the assets passed down to individuals after someone dies.

Specifically, this inheritance is a relationship with God and the blessings that come along with that.

It means:

We are co-heirs with Jesus of God’s Kingdom.

We walk in the authority Jesus has given us.

We are called children of God.

All this is great. But I have seen deals go bad before. So what about some sort of down payment. A promise or vow or something.

Our promise is the Holy Spirit.

Have you ever heard someone say, “The Trinity isn’t in the Bible?” True, that word is never mentioned. But things like this are very prevalent.

God the Father loved us and chose us.

God the Son (Jesus) redeems and saves us.

God the Holy Spirit empowers us and is the promise of said inheritance.

So does that mean the Holy Spirit comes into our lives later? No! As soon as you accept the gift of salvation in Jesus, you receive this promise. The HS.

He was given to us, to empower us daily, and as a promise of hope.

There is this cool paradox Christianity. There are a lot actually. One of the most frustrating is called “already not yet.” It is the tension we live in as Christ followers. Salvation and redemption work like this.

Past fact

Present experience

Future hope

So the Holy Spirit is our confirmation that we are saved, the power of God working in us and through us to live God-honoring lives, and also the promise & taste of something better in the future.

I don’t know about you, but I prefer my guarantee’s as something I can see, feel, touch, taste, something. So how do I know that the Holy Spirit is living inside me? How do I know God has taken up residence in my life?

Galatians 5:22–23 NLT

But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!

These are called the fruit of the Spirit. A couple interesting things. First, it is singular. That means that the Holy Spirit produces all of these in the lives of those who have accepted the gift of salvation in Jesus. This is how you know that the Holy Spirit is living inside of you.

Does that mean you have to nail these 100% of the time? Absolutely not. Does it mean there should be evidence of these in your live and that the Holy Spirit will convict you when you are walking contrary to them? Yes.

(Give examples of what these may look like in the life of a believer. Assure them that these will be gone over in more depth later in the year.)

God never desires for us to be lost, confused, or scared. He has given us the Holy Spirit so that we can share His love with others. We should also praise Him, because He saved us from so much.