God's Great Round-up

Ephesians 1:13-14
By Harold Dinsmore, M.Div.
© 2007 Harold Dinsmore

Last week we talked about “there ain’t no easy horses.”  The idea behind that was as believers if life bucks us off and we end up on the ground, we don’t stay on the ground.  We get back up and go at it again.  In John 16:33 we discover Jesus warning us that trouble was bound to come in our lives whether we wanted to believe it or not.  He calls us to faith because he has overcome the world.  Today we are going to not talk about horses but cattle.  And look at the similarities between us and the cattle industry of the old west.

As we look to our scripture passage for today, I trust you will see the unique marking we have as Christians.  In Ephesians 1:13-14 we read, “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation.  Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.”  It’s like he brands us as his own.  God marks his own.  We are God’s people and the children of his pasture. “Know that the Lord is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.”  Psalms 100:3.