The Counsel of His Own Will (Martyn Lloyd-Jones)

Ephesians 1:11-14

“In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ. In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise, Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.

We are not considering some abstract truth. Before time, before the creation of the world, God purposed, according to the counsel of His own will, to restore harmony to the whole of the cosmos; and in particular He has purposed that you and I should have a part and place in it—‘In whom also we have obtained an inheritance.’ We have this part and place because God predestinated us to it according to the purpose which He purposed according to the counsel of His own will. The result is that you and I are sharing in this, and have tasted of the heavenly gift. You and I know something about the ‘firstfruits’ of everlasting bliss and glory. you and I are what we are for the reason that God purposed according to the counsel of His own will that we should be in it and should be sharers of it.

‘Predestinated’ means ‘pre-determined.’ What can be greater or more staggering than this, that God thought of me, thought of you there in the counsel of His own will! He not only conceived the plan, he saw us in it. ‘We,’ says Paul—‘we Jews, who first trusted in Christ were predestinated, and you Gentiles also have a part in this inheritance. God has pre-determined that we should both be in it, Jews and Gentiles. We are not only in the mind and the heart of God; we were always there. We are there now because we were there before the foundation of the world.’

It is God also who works out this purpose. This is the most amazing and the most consoling and comforting truth we can ever know. It is the whole basis of my assurance at this present moment; it is also the guarantee of my future. It is God Himself who put me where I am, and ‘He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ’ (Philippians 1:6). I am in this plan of God, and I am what I am in spite of my sin, in spite of all that is so true of me, in spite of the fact that I was, with others, ‘dead in trespasses and sins.’ ‘Being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things according to the counsel of his own will.’

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