Ephesians 1:1-14

The Dec. 11, 2002 online issue of Forbes magazine carried the story of a family feud in one of the richest families in America. The Pritzker family of Chicago owns the Hyatt hotel chain. They also own many other businesses, including cruise lines, railroads, and banks. In 2002, 18-year-old Liesel Pritzker sued her father and other family members, claiming that they drained her trust fund of more than $1 billion. Because of their mismanagement, Liesel claims her inheritance has been greatly reduced. She is suing for $5 billion dollars in punitive damages.

One billion dollars. Poor Liesel. Some of us would like to have her problems. She didn’t have to lift a finger to earn this money. It’s just there, what’s left of it, earning interest, and waiting for her to collect it. Don’t you just weep for her? Perhaps we should. No amount of money is worth being alienated from your family. It’s sad to think that Ms. Pritzker didn’t trust her own father to protect her inheritance for her.

What would you do if you knew you had an enormous inheritance waiting for you? Would it make a difference in how you live while you wait to receive it?

I heard recently about a man who came into some money unexpectedly. In 1959, James Carter was a convict in a Mississippi prison. While working on the prison’s road crew, Carter taught his fellow convicts a mournful song called “Po’ Lazarus.” A visitor happened to record the men singing. The recording ended up in an archive file. Forty years later, the producers of the movie “O Brother, Where Art Thou” came across the recording and used “Po’ Lazarus” as the opening song on their soundtrack. The soundtrack was a surprise hit, selling millions of copies. Imagine James Carter’s surprise when, 41 years after his stint in prison, two men from a record company showed up at his door with a $20,000 royalty check for a song he didn’t even remember. Since then, this obscure song from the prison road crew has earned Carter thousands of dollars.

Do you think that unexpected blessing changed Mr. Carter’s life in any way? Would it change yours, if you were in his place?

The apostle Paul was known for a sort of single-minded enthusiasm. He was extraordinarily enthusiastic when he wrote a letter to the Ephesians. In the original Greek version, it begins with a 220-word run-on sentence written by a man who was so excited he didn’t even stop long enough to throw in a comma. It’s an English teacher’s nightmare. What was Paul so excited about? He was excited about our inheritance as believers in Jesus.

Listen to the extravagant language Paul used in this passage. He says that God “has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ,” and that He has “lavished” on us the “riches of God’s grace.” And if that’s not enough, we have been given the Holy Spirit as a guarantee of an even greater inheritance waiting for us in heaven. To Paul this was exciting stuff–stuff he was willing to give his life to declare. I wonder if it’s exciting to us, today. Why should it matter to us–that we have an inheritance in heaven?

It might matter to you if you’ve ever been forced to make a hard choice about right and wrong. Sometimes you and I are forced to make difficult decisions, ethical decisions, that require us to choose a path that is temporarily more painful, but ultimately more rewarding. This is what following Jesus is all about. It’s living a life of integrity, faithfulness and love. And that’s not always easy.

There have been followers of Jesus through the ages who have stood up to injustice, stood up to intolerance, stood up to violence, stood up to oppression and all they had going for them was Jesus’ love and the promise of an imperishable inheritance.

Paul was writing to people who were being persecuted for their faith. Paul himself was imprisoned twice while preaching in Ephesus. He knew what it meant to choose between conformity and commitment, and he knew how difficult that choice would be for each of us. But ultimately this life isn’t our focus, and earthly pleasures aren’t our goal. We have an eternal inheritance in which we place our hopes.

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Rev. Charles Eldredge is a member of Maitland Church of the Brethren. He has a Facebook page and can be contacted by email: ce1133 @verizon.net.