Ephesians 1:1-14

Chapter 1

Chapter 1:1-14

A1 Scripture

Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, To the saints who are in Ephesus, and faithful in Christ Jesus: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace which He made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself, that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth—in Him. In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will, (Ephesians 1:1-11 NKJV)

A2 Outline

B1 Intro

C1 Author: Holy Spirit

C2 Writer: Paul

B2 Addressees

C1 God's people in Ephesus

C2 The faithful in Christ Jesus (the rest of us)

A3 Notes: Dealings with God and His people (Christians)

B1 Who has blessed us .

C1 When the lesser blesses, he thanks and praises the greater.

C2 When the greater blesses, it is gifts of many types.

D1 Spiritual blessings

E1 Fruit of the Spirit: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control–against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:22-23, WPNT)

E2 Some blessing listed here

F1 Adoption

F2 Forgiveness of sins

F3 Knowledge of the mystery (The Gospel)

F4 Our gathering together (Unity—God's unity not the worldly unity that is currently preached uniting believers with heretics and apostates).

F5 An inheritance (Heaven and especially fellowship with God).

E3 God himself. (Jesus Christ is the ultimate blessing in this life, because of all He is and is, has, and will do).

D2 Heavenly blessings

B2 He has chosen us.

C1 Meaning of the word

D1 A choosing for Himself.

D2 To pick out as in upon seeing a number of choices, one is picked out. If I went with a brother to a cafe, and he said, "Pick out something on the menu; I'll pay for it," and I picked out the fried ehis word means.

C2 He chose us.

D1 This decision, the plan, was made before the creation of the world.

D2 This decision is God's plan.

D3 This does not seem to involve individuals as much as the group/set consisting of Christians. (Consider corporate election).

D4 Election is different than unconditional election.

E1 Unconditional election, in its various versions, is where God makes His choice of who goes to heaven and who goes to hell. The elect for heaven have no choice in the matter, nor those who are the elect for hell. God does the choosing. (See, Election is, therefore, that decree of God which He eternally makes, by which, with sovereign freedom, He chooses to Himself a people, upon whom He determines to set His love, whom He rescues from sin and death through Jesus Christ, unto Himself in everlasting glory.

This election is sovereign - God's sovereign and free choice. This election is eternal even as God's counsel is eternal. This election is unchangeable even as God's counsel is unchangeable. This election is efficacious so that the decree of election itself is, through Christ, the power by which the elect are actually saved. Source).

E2 Conditional election is, Therefore, election is corporate and embraces individual persons only as they identify and associate themselves with the body of Christ, the true church (Ephesians 1:22-23 and source).

C3 Chose for a purpose.

D1 For us to be holy

D2 And blameless

D3 To be adopted

E1 Sons and daughters of God

E2 Privileges of the family

E3 Possible because of the atoning death of Jesus Christ

E4 2 Corinthians 6:18 WPNT And, “I will be a Father to you, and you will be sons and daughters to me, says the LORD Almighty.”

B3 He predestined us.

C1 Meaning of the word

D1 Plan, though, because of theology it has picked up the meaning of exhaustively determined.

D2 Predetermine in the sense of a decision was determined before the situation that demanded it. So, it is a plan, a decision, that occurred in the past before creation.

D3 It does not mean to pick out an individual and determine him/her to heaven or hell.

D4 I would never chose him for I was dead and could not, but the Holy Spirit opened my eyes and heart to the Gospel and offered me salvation. I could resist or not resist. If God had not predestined me, I would never have believed.

C2 Predestination was done "in love," though "in love" might refer to verse 4 in which it would refer to our love to Him.

C3 Predestination is for adoption not salvation. It was God’s plan.

C4 The good pleasure of His will, that is, this was a happy decision.

C5 It is of grace, which is receiving what we do not deserve.

B4 He has made us accepted in the beloved.

C1 Grace has made us accepted.

C2 Grace is getting what we do not deserve.

C3 We deserve hell, but instead, because of His grace we are accepted, not rejected.

C4 Those who are rejected are those who resisted God's gracious call.

D1 Luke 13:34 EMTV "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, like a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you were not willing!

D2 John 5:40 EMTV But you are unwilling to come to Me, so that you may have life.

B5 We have redemption.

C1 Meaning of the word

D1 Freedom because of something paid.

D2 Deliverance

D3 Jesus suffered and died to pay the penalty of sin.

C2 How

D1 Through His blood. No blood shed, no salvation.

D2 Because of His shed blood, we have forgiveness of sins.

C3 Some cross references

D1 Galatians 3:13-14 EMTV Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us, for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree," 14 so that the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

D2 Colossians 1:13-14 WPNT who delivered us out of the dominion of the darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have the redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our sins.

D3 Romans 5:6 EMTV For while we were still weak, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.

D4 Hebrews 13:12 EMTV Therefore Jesus also, so that He might sanctify the people through His own blood, suffered outside the gate.

D5 John 19:30 EMTV Therefore when Jesus received the sour wine, He said, "It is finished!" And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit.

B6 His grace is abounded.

C1 Not just a little grace but lots of grace.

C2 Wisdom

D1 Wisdom deals with decision making.

D2 God shows His wisdom in salvation and the plan of salvation.

C3 Prudence

D1 Making a choice with moral insight

D2 Deals with the practical details of how to carry this plan/decision out.

B7 He made known to us the mystery of His will.

C1 The mystery of His will is the Gospel.

D1 1 Timothy 3:16 EMTV And confessedly, great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifested in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among [the] Gentiles, believed on in the world, [and] was received up in glory.

D2 t2 Timothy 1:10 EMTV but has now been revealed through the appearance of our Savior Jesus Christ, having abolished death on the one hand, [and] having brought to life immortality through the gospel on the other.

D3 A mystery: what was hidden is now known

C2 He knew the plan but did not reveal it until the time of Jesus on this earth.

D1 This plan was done in

E1 Accordance with His good pleasure (satisfaction, delight)

E2 His plan not a plan put together by others

E3 Psalms 33:11 GNB92 But his plans endure forever; his purposes last eternally.

D2 A plan hatched in justice and love

B8 He will gather us together.

C1 The true unity of believers is not the forced, and we are still a family in the 21st century.

C2 God does this gathering, not some pastor, church, or group of people.

B9 We have an inheritance.

C1 Our main inheritance is God himself.

C2 Jesus shares His inheritance with us (Romans 8:17 CSB - and if children, also heirs—heirs of God and coheirs with Christ—if indeed we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him).

C3 Includes

D1 Forgiveness of sins

D2 Heaven

D3 Fellowship with God, holy angels, and God's people

D4 Relief from the sufferings caused by sin.

B10 Applications

C1 God made a plan. He followed that plan.

C2 Jesus always was, is, and will be Messiah.

C3 God’s plan, through Abraham, was to have a physical nation, Israel, and a spiritual nation, the church. When one is born again, they enter the spiritual nation, the church, which is Christ’s body.

C4 We are a family of believers.

C5 We have an inheritance.

C6 We need to preach the Gospel.

James 5

James Chapter 5

B1 The sins of the rich James 5:1-6

C1 Often trusting in money instead of God

D1 We are offered a choice, who are we going to serve, who are we going to love? Luke 16:13 WEL 13 "No household servant can serve two masters, for he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon."

D2 Money and things have their place and what we have we are to be disciplined with. Luke 16:9-12 WEL 9 "And also I say to you, ‘Make friends for yourselves by the unrighteous Mammon, so that when you fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations.' 10 "He who faithful in what is least is also faithful in much, and he who is unjust in the least is also unjust in much. 11 "Therefore, if you didn't prove to be faithful with unrighteous Mammon, who will trust you with the true [riches]? 12 "If you didn't prove to be faithful in what is another's, who will give you what is your own?

E1 We are to use riches to help others in need. Our priorities.

F1 First, our spouse

F2 Second, our children

F3 The brothers and sisters of our local congregation

F4 Brothers and sisters elsewhere

F5 The unsave

E2 It is not wrong to give riches to those who are proclaiming the Gospel or other missionary work, but we are not to neglect those closer to us.

E3 If we can’t handle money, how can we handle God’s riches.

E4 We need to be faithful to what God has given/allowed us to have.

C2 Often money gotten with ungodly methods (unrighteous Mammon)

C3 Don't pay your employees

C4 Lived in pleasure instead of the fear of God and helping others

C5 Their evil treatment of the just

D1 Condemned

D2 Killed

D3 Note: "He does not resist you." Nonresistance, trusting God instead of war and revenge.

B2 Patience James 5:7-11

C1 The Christian life leads to persecution. This persecution may be spiritual (temptation), emotional, or physical. 2 Timothy 3:12 WEB  Yes, and all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution.

C2 Goal: wait for the Lord Jesus to return

C2 Example: Farmer waiting for rain and harvest

C3 While waiting,

D1 Establish your hearts James  5:8

E1 Establish means to be set fast, as in setting a posting in concrete.

E2 A dedication to God and His ways as outlined in His book—the Bible (the New Testament specifically).

D2 Don't spend time complaining about the brethren James 5:9

D3 Endure whatever comes your way

E1 As the prophets of God James 5:10

E2 Job 5:11

B3 False oaths James 5:12

C1 We must learn to tell the truth.

C2 Our "yes" must mean "yes" and our "no" mean "no".

B4 What to do in troubles/afflictions James 5:13-16

C1 Afflicted: Pray

C2 Happy: Sing psalms

C3 Sick: Call for the elders

D1 Pray

D2 Anointing

D3 Prayer

D4 Mutual confession of sins

B5 Praying James 5:17-18

C1 Effectual prayer

D1 Opposite of a dead, formal prayer

D2 Does NOT mean something is guaranteed (a prayer that God HAS to answer. There is no such thing.)

D3 Meets conditions

E1 Confessed sin (including asking forgiveness from those who we sinned against)

E2 Treating wife right (according to what the Bible says is the right way)

E3 Praying in faith (God can answer this prayer)

E4 Leaving the results to God

E5 Content to wait

E6 Not trying to manipulating God (which cannot be done)

C2 Waiting for God's answer

B6 What to do with those who err from the truth James 5:19-20

C1 Point it out

D1 In gentleness

D2 In truth

D3 Remembering that we too are sinners

C2 It's blessing

D1 Save a soul from death. Romans 6:16 Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves as servants to obedience, his servants you are whom you obey; whether of sin to death, or of obedience to righteousness?

D2 Hide a multitude of sins

E1 Comment: they will be forgiven, hidden under the blood of the Lord Jesus

E2 We must preach and live the Gospel for everyone faces 2 deaths—physical and spiritual. The final death is conscious suffering in the Lake of Fire. Revelation 21:8 WEB  But for the cowardly, unbelieving, sinners, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their part is in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

E3 Messiah Jesus is the ONLY savior.

F1 2 Peter 2:9 NRSV  then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trial, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment.

F2 Acts 4:12 WEB  There is salvation in none other, for neither is there any other name under heaven, that is given among men, by which we must be saved!”

Our strength, our life, our hope is In Christ Alone

What we can learn from the story of Joseph

Part of a sermon by delivered August 20, 1893, by J. W. McGarvey. Originally published by the Standard Publishing Company, Cincinnati, Ohio, in McGarvey’s Sermons. 

"You go, as Joseph did, but you fail to find them. While you search you meet a stranger who tells you they are gone to Dothan, fourteen or fifteen miles farther away. With this news Joseph continued his journey, and how his heart leaped at last to see his brothers again! How glad a welcome he expected from them and inquiries about home, and father, and all. But when he came up, he saw a scowl upon every face. Instead of welcoming, they seized him, and with rough hands stripped the coat from his back, dragged him to the mouth of a dry cistern, and let him down in it. “Now we will see what will become of his dreams.”

"How did the boy then feel? I have thought that perhaps he said to himself, “My brothers are only trying to scare me. They are just playing a cruel joke on me, and don’t mean to leave me here to perish.” But perhaps he had begun to think they were in earnest, when he heard footsteps above, and voices. He sees one of their faces looking down, and a rope let down to draw him up, and he thinks the cruel joke is over. But when he is drawn up and sees those strangers there, and hears words about the sale of the boy, and his hands are tied behind him, and he is delivered into their hands, and they start off with him, what would you have thought or felt then? If the thought had come into his mind that it was another joke, he might have watched as the merchants passed down the road, on every rising piece of ground he might have looked back to see if his brothers were coming to buy him back again, and to get through with this terrible joke; but when the whole day’s journey was passed, and they went into camp at night, and the same the next day, no brothers have overtaken him, what must have been his feelings? When he thought, “I am a slave, and I am being carried away into a foreign land to spend the rest of my life as a slave, never to see father and home again,” who can imagine his feelings? So he was brought down into Egypt and sold.

"But it seems to me that Joseph must have had one thought to bear him up, at least for a time. “My father loves me. He loves me more than he does all my brothers. He is a rich man. When he hears that I have been sold into Egypt, he will send one hundred men, if need be, to hunt me up; he will load them with money to buy me back. I trust in my father for deliverance yet. But he is sold into the house of Pharaoh, and years pass by. He is cruelly cast into prison, and years pass by, until thirteen long years of darkness and gloom and sorrow and pain have gone, and he has never heard of his father sending for him. He could have done it. It would have been easy to do, And now, how does he feel toward his brothers and toward his father? Would you have wanted to see those brothers again? And when he found his father had never sent for him, knowing, perhaps, how penurious and avaricious his father had been in his younger days, may he not have said, “The old avaricious spirit of my father has come back on him in his declining years, and he loves his money more than he loves his boy?” And when that feeling took possession of him, did he want to see his father anymore? Or any of them? Could he bear the thought of ever seeing those brothers again? And could he at last bear the thought of seeing that father who had allowed him to perish, as it were, without stretching out a hand to help him? The way he did feel is seen in one little circumstance. When he was married and his first-born son was placed before him, he named him Manasseh, “forgetfulness,” “Because,” he says, “God has enabled me to forget my father’s house.” The remembrance of home and brothers and father had been a source of constant pain to him; he never could think of them without agony of heart; but now, “Thank God, I have forgotten them.” Oh, brethren, what a terrible experience a boy must have before he feels a sense of relief and gladness that he has been enabled to forget all about his father and his brothers in his early home! That is the way Joseph felt when Manasseh was born. And would not you have felt so, too?

"Everything was going on more pleasantly than he thought it ever could, with him—riches, honor, wife, children: everything that could delight the heart of a wise and good man—when suddenly, one day his steward comes in and tells him that there are ten foreigners who desire to buy some grain. He had a rule that all foreigners must be brought before him before they were allowed to buy grain. Bring them in. They were brought in, and behold, there are his brothers! There are his brothers! And as they approach, they bow down before him. Of course, they could not recognize him, dressed in the Egyptian style—governor of Egypt. Even if he had looked like Joseph, it would only have been a strange thing with them to say, He resembles our brother Joseph. There they are. It was a surprising sight to him and a painful one. He instantly determines to treat them in such a way that they will never come back to Egypt again. He says, “Ye are spies; to see the nakedness of the land ye are come.” “No,” they say, “we are come to buy food; we are all the sons of one man in the land of Canaan. We are twelve brothers. The youngest is with our father, and one is not.”

"That remark about the youngest awakened a new thought in Joseph. Oh how it brought back the sad hour when his own mother, dying on the way that they were journeying, left that little Benjamin, his only full brother, in the hands of the weeping father! And how it reminded him, that when he was sold, Benjamin was a little lad at home. He is my own mother’s child. Instantly he resolves that Benjamin shall be here with him in Egypt, and that these others shall be scared away, so that they will never come back again; so he says, “Send one of you, and let him bring your brother, that your words may be proved, or else by the life of Pharaoh ye are spies.” He cast them all into prison; but on the third day he went to them and said: “I fear God; if ye be true men let one of you be bound in prison, and let the others go and carry food for your houses; and bring your youngest brother to me; so shall your words be verified, and ye shall not die.” When he said that, they began to confess to one another their belief about the providential cause of this distress, when Reuben made a speech that brought a revelation to Joseph, He said to his brethren, “Spake I not unto you, saying, Do not sin against the child; and ye would not hear. Therefore, behold his blood is required.” Joseph learns for the first time that Reuben had befriended him, and this so touched his heart that he turned aside to weep. He passes by Reuben and takes the next to the oldest for the prisoner.

"He now gave the directions to his steward to sell them the grain; and why did he order the money to be tied up in the mouth of every man’s sack? “They were once so mean and avaricious that they sold me for fifteen petty pieces of silver. I will put their silver in the mouths of their sacks, and I will see if they are as dishonest as they were then. If they are, I will never hear of that money again.” Not many merchants in these days, if you go in and buy ten dollars’ worth of goods, will wrap the ten dollars in the bundle to see if it will come back. “I will see,” thought Joseph, “if they are honest.”

"Time went on—a good deal more than Joseph expected, on account of the unwillingness of Jacob to let Benjamin make the journey. But finally the news is brought that these ten Canaanites have returned. They are brought once more into his presence, and there is Benjamin. They still call him the “little one” and “the lad”; just as I have had mothers to introduce me to “the baby,” and the baby would be a strapping fellow six feet high. There he is. “Is this your youngest brother of whom you spoke?” He waits not for an answer, but exclaims, “God be gracious unto thee, my son.” He slips away into another room to weep. How near he is now to carrying out his plan—to having that dear brother, who had never harmed him, to enjoy his honors and riches and glory, and get rid of the others. He has them to dine in his house. That scared them. To dine with the governor! They could not conceive what it meant. Joseph knew. He had his plan formed. He wanted them there to give them a chance to steal something out of the dining-room. They enjoyed the dinner. They had never seen before so rich a table. He says to the steward, “Fill the men’s sacks with food; put every man’s money in his sack’s mouth, and put my silver cup in the sack’s mouth of the youngest.” It was done, and at daylight next morning they were on their journey home. They were not far on the way when the steward overtook them, with the demand, “Why have ye rewarded evil for good? Is it not this in which my Lord drinketh, and wherewith he divineth? Ye have done evil in so doing.” They answered, “God forbid that thy servants should do such a thing. Search, and if it be found with any one of us, let him die, and the rest of us will be your bondmen.” “No,” says the steward, “he with whom it is found shall be my bondman, and ye shall be blameless.” He begins his search with Reuben’s sack. It is not there. Then one by one he takes down the sacks of the others, until he reaches Benjamin’s. There is the cup! They all rend their clothes; and when the steward starts back with Benjamin, they follow him. They are frightened almost to death, but the steward can not get rid of them. Joseph was on the lookout for the steward and Benjamin. Yonder they come, but behind them are all the ten. What shall now be done? They come in and fall down before him once more, and say, “We are thy bondmen. God has found out our iniquity.” “No,” he says, “the man in whose hand the cup is found shall be my bondman; but as for you, get you up in peace to your father.”

"Joseph thought that his plan was a success. They will be glad to go in peace. I will soon have it all right with Benjamin. They will hereafter send somebody else to buy their grain. But Judah arose, drew near, and begged the privilege of speaking a word. He recites the incidents of their first visit, and speaks of the difficulty with which they had induced their father to let Benjamin come. He quotes from his father these words: “Ye know that my wife bore me two sons; one of them went out from me, and I said surely he is torn in pieces; and I have not seen him since, If ye take this one also from me and mischief befall him, ye shall bring down my grey hairs with sorrow to the grave.” He closes with the proposal, “Let thy servant, I pray thee, abide instead of the lad, a bondman to my lord, and let the lad go up with his brethren.” Here was a revelation to Joseph—two of them. First, I have been blaming my old father for these twenty-two years because he did not send down into Egypt and hunt me up, and buy me out, and take me home; and now I see I have been blaming him unjustly, for he thought I was dead—that some wild beast had torn me in pieces. O what self-reproach, and what a revival of love for his old father! And here, again, I have been trying to drive these brothers away from me, as unworthy of any countenance on my part, or even an acquaintance with them; but what a change has come over them! The very men that once sold me for fifteen paltry pieces of silver, are now willing to be slaves themselves, rather than see their youngest brother made a slave, even when he appears to be guilty of stealing. What a change! Immediately all of his old affection for them takes possession of him, and with these two revelations flashing upon him, it is not surprising that he broke out into loud weeping. He weeps, and falls upon his brothers’ necks, He says, “I am Joseph.” A thought flashes through his mind, never conceived before, and he says, “Be not grieved, or angry with yourselves that ye sold me hither.” He sees now God’s hand all through this strange, sad experience, and using a Hebraism, he says, “It was not you that sent me hither, but God; God did send me before to preserve life.” When he was a prisoner there in the prison, he did not see God’s hand. I suppose he thought that it was all of the devil; but now that he has gotten to the end of the vista and looks back, he sees it is God who has done it. He sees in part what we saw in the first part of this discourse. O, my friends, many times when you shall have passed through deep waters that almost overwhelm you, and shall have felt alienated from all the friends you had on earth, thinking that they had deserted you, wait a little longer, and you will look up and say it was God; it was the working of grand, glorious, and blessed purposes that He had in his mind concerning you.

"The last question we can dispose of now very quickly, because it has been almost entirely anticipated. Why did God select ten men to be the heads of ten tribes of his chosen people, who were so base as to sell their brother? O, my brethren, it was not the ten who sold their brother that God selected, but the ten who were willing to be slaves instead of their brother. These are the ten that he chose. If you and I shall get to heaven, why will God admit us there? Not because of what we once were, but because of what He shall have made out of us by His dealings with us. He had his mind on the outcome, and not on the beginning. If you and I had to be judged by what we were at one time, there would be no hope for us. I am glad to know that my chances for the approval of the Almighty are based on what I hope to be, and not on what I am. Thank God for that!

"And they were worthy. How many men who, when the youngest brother of the family was clearly guilty of stealing, and was about to be made a slave, would say, “Let me be the slave, and let him go home to his father”? Not many. And what had brought about the wondrous change which they had undergone? Ah, here we have the other illustration of God’s providential government to which I have alluded. When these men held up the bloody coat before their father, knowing that Joseph was not dead, as he supposed, but not able to tell him so because the truth would be still more distressing than the fiction, What father would not rather a thousand times over that one of his sons should be dead, than that one of them should be kidnapped and sold into foreign bondage by the others? If their father’s grief was inconsolable, their own remorse was intolerable. For twenty-two long years they writhed under it, and there is no wonder that then they should prefer foreign bondage themselves rather than to witness a renewal of their father’s anguish. The same chain of providence which brought them unexpectedly into Egypt, had fitted them for the high honors which were yet to crown their names.

"Is there a poor sinner here today, whom God has disciplined, whether less or more severely than He did those men, and brought to repentance? If so, the kind Redeemer whom you rejected, and sold, as it were, to strangers, stands ready to forgive you more completely and perfectly than Joseph forgave his brethren. He has found out your iniquity; he knows it all; but he died that he might be able to forgive you. Come in his appointed way; come guilty and trembling, as Joseph’s brothers came, and you will find His everlasting arms around you."

The wonder that God can change any situation if we are willing. Even if God does not want to change the situation He will give us grace to bear it. 2 Corinthians 12:7