James & Carolanne

I, James, have been reading through the book of Ephesians lately in my devotions and can't help but be amazed at the words that Paul uses to describe how God values us and our relationship with Him. I'm also trying to teach myself to do a little journaling while I read, and I thought I would share some of my insights here.

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. (Eph. 1:3 NLT)

After a very brief introduction to the letter regarding who he is and to whom it is written (verses 1 and 2), Paul launches into this amazing description of God's wonderful love for us. When I was reading this, I got stuck on the phrase "has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms". What does that mean exactly? What ARE spiritual blessings? I would assume they include things like the spiritual gifts, the fruit of the Spirit, His presence, His love, ... I doubt I could ever come up with a complete list, but I think the most important one would be the blessing of Himself. He gave Himself to us, made Himself accessible to us and adopted us into His family.

When I look honestly at myself and my life, I quickly realise that I'm really not worth much. I'm just one small voice in among 6+ billion others, each of whom also have their own lives, plans, goals, problems... Even all of us together, really are just ants crawling around on a globe, hurtling through space and time with no control over where it takes us. Yet, in spite of our insignificance, God, the almighty creator of everything that is, was and ever will be, has taken an interest in us. More than that, He VALUES us, as his prized possession. He values us SO much He sent His Son to become one of us, so that He might communicate more effectively with us and give us hope and a future, when we were destined for destruction.

I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
- Jesus (John 10:10b NIV)

That's it for today. Maybe I'll write again one of these days and take on the next verse or two. Hope you found it inspirational. Now it's 12:30 and I'm tired and need to sleep.