In his sermon 'The Gospel Ministry pt.1', Carl Provost delves into Ephesians chapter 3, focusing on the calling and role of a gospel minister. He emphasizes that being a minister is a divine calling from God, not a personal decision or an office decided by the church. The sermon highlights the transformation of Paul from a persecutor of Christians to the apostle to the Gentiles, showcasing the power of the gospel to change lives. Provost also discusses the purpose of gospel preaching, which is to convey the unsearchable riches of Christ, emphasizing that these riches are found in Christ himself, not in worldly achievements or events. The sermon cautions against replacing the gospel message with current events or political activism, asserting that the gospel's relevance is eternal and not confined to contemporary issues. It also touches on the process of recognizing a minister's call and the importance of humility, gifting, and regeneration in ministry. Ultimately, the sermon calls for a return to gospel preaching as a means to transform lives and communities.

Please take your copy of God's Word and turn to Ephesians chapter 3. Starting in verse 1. Actually starting in verse 1. For this cause I, Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ, for you Gentiles, if ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to youward. How that the revelation he made known unto me the mystery as I wrote afore in a few words whereby when you read you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ, which in the ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets, That the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, and of the same body and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel.

Whereof I was made a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power. Unto me, who am less than the least of the saints, is this grace given that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. Let's go again to the Lord in prayer. Heavenly Father, we come before you, Father, and we thank you for this word you've given us, Father. As we look at the church, as we look at the Gospel and the ministry of the Gospel, Father, recognizing that you have set us apart as your people and that you have set men apart for the preaching of this gospel, foolishness to the world, but the wisdom of God, in order to save those whom you have made part of your household.

We pray in your Son Christ Jesus' name, Amen. As we come to today's text and we look at this and the practical teachings that we've seen as he has tried to bring these Galatians along to understand how they are fully a part of the household of God and what Christ has accomplished for them and the mystery of the gospel. And as we come to the verses that we'll focus on this week, verses seven and eight, we'll look at the gospel ministry. So what is it to be a minister of the gospel? If you listen to preachers who have been preaching for many years and pull pitch, you'll hear many of them have stories about those who have approached them through the years, or even inside the church or outside the church, about what they do.

Oftentimes when asked what you do, if you tell somebody you're a gospel preacher, they have all different kinds of ideas of what that actually is. And for many, that might mean the guy who works one day a week. For not many understand what exactly it means to be called, at least outside the church, to be a minister of the gospel. A well-known minister who's preached in the same pulpit for probably 30 plus years was sharing a story about one of his congregants that took him out to lunch. Took him out and proceeded to talk with him about what he should be doing in his role of the ministry.

And he told him, he said, anyone can stand behind a box and talk. And in his assumption of the ministry, that's what this gentleman was doing. He goes on to finish the story. He said, he finally gave this man an opportunity to stand behind a box and talk. And that man no longer has a desire to do that, found out that there's more involved in standing behind a pulpit and preaching God's Word than he thought.

Plus the many other shepherding responsibilities that are given to a minister. But there's one main call that we see in this text that's given to ministers of the gospel. When we see a lot of different views of what that means today in churches today, some preachers start their sermons with the news, looking for current events. They want to preach sermons that I think are relevant to today. Sermons that address modern issues, modern problems.

Oftentimes those outside the church viewing God's Word is no longer relevant. How can a letter written to a church 2, 000 years ago have any relevance to us? Well actually in preaching the gospel one of the tasks of the minister is to take a text that is relevant until Christ returns And to bridge that gap from the contemporaries that it was written to, the Ephesians, and to bring it in application to today. And as we have seen, God's Word is always relevant. And that anybody who starts outside of the Word of God for his message is not true to God's Word.

We looked last week at the church and the household of God. And as we talked about those outward externals that define a church, one of those was that the true or pure preaching of the Word of God. And as I said, this is a mark of the church. And as we look today, we're going to look at the service of the gospel and the message of the gospel. So as we look at verse 7, what do we learn from Paul?

It says, whereof I was made a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power. First thing I want us to notice is that the office of A minister is a call. It's not an office that somebody decides, wakes up one day and they say, I want to be a minister of the gospel. It's a call that's placed upon the life of a minister by God himself. In fact, the word minister here, for those who sometimes desire the office because they desire the authority, the word minister here is the same word we get for servant.

A minister is a servant, a servant of Christ, a servant of the church, a servant to the gospel of Christ. In fact, they're men that are called to be servant leaders. Now we recognize this, that men are called. But a church does not call a minister. A church recognizes a call to a minister.

God places the call upon the heart of a man. It says, if a man desires to be an elder, he desires a good thing. And so we recognize that a call to gospel ministry has to be a call that's placed there by God. And so as a church, the church is to examine a man and to determine whether That call is truly there. And they will look for certain things.

And we have other places in Scripture where we look at the pastoral epistles that give us a criteria that that man must meet in order to be a minister of the gospel. We also see that the office of minister is a gift of God's grace. It is a gift. And so for that man to have the gifting in order to serve in that capacity, It's a gifting that's placed there by God Himself. And so another thing the church does when it's looking at a man to recognize whether he has to call it, they're also looking to see whether he has the gifting.

Has God gifted him with the ability to teach? But this word is actually broader, even though Paul is using it here in the context of one who preaches the gospel. The same word also applies to those other servants. Those who were set apart for the service of the gospel in order to come alongside the apostles in order to relieve them for the preaching and teaching of the gospel, and that's the office of deacon, also ministers of the gospel. And so we see that even that office of deacon is an office that is given by God, a call placed upon the heart of the man, a call recognized by those in the church with giftings that are given by the grace of God.

So with that understanding, it should not be an office of obligation. No one should feel like they have an obligation to serve in this role. It should be one compelled by the Spirit of Christ to serve that role. It shouldn't be from outside pressures of other men or outside pressures of family. When I was in seminary, I ran across many men who you would ask them, Why are you here?

Oh well, I didn't really know what to do with my life, but my parents thought that maybe I should be in the ministry. And so they would go to seminary. Or someone said, you know, you seem like you had interest in the things of God, and maybe you should go to seminary. And some of these men in seminary came to the realization that they were not called to the ministry and did not follow through with taking a position within the church because they recognized that it was not something that they were doing out of a love that God had placed in their heart. It was something they were doing out of an obligation.

And it was a burden they were not able to carry and to bear. Men called to the office should see it as a privilege and an honor. Oftentimes in the early colonial church there were men who entered the ministry. In fact there were some who entered in the clergy that oftentimes were not regenerate men. And it was very apparent to many of these men during the Great Awakening that they did not possess the Spirit of Christ.

In fact, there were a number of men who resigned from this office or were saved during the Great Awakening because they were filling pulpits as unregenerate men and God raised them up to newness of life. For in order To be an effective worker in ministry of the gospel, you must be one who has been gifted by the effectual working of his power. See, the office of minister here is clearly stated, Paul is saying that it is by the grace of God and by the effectual working of His power. So it is an office of called, gifted, and regenerate men. And so when we call a man, when we present a man to the church for the office of elder or for the office of deacon, It is a man who has clearly displayed that he is gifted for that office.

And the church has recognized that gift that God has placed there. And they put them before the congregation to vote. It's a recognition of the gift that God has already placed there by his own effectual power. In fact, in our own denomination, when you look at gospel ministers, once the church elects that man, he then goes to presbytery, where the men there examine that man. They make sure he meets the criteria, both in knowledge and in the spiritual walk, to serve within that capacity.

And our presbytery ordains men to the office of elder to be gospel ministers. And as long as they are ordained to that office, they serve in that capacity under the authority of the presbytery to preach the gospel. And within our denomination, this is recognized across the churches of our denomination because they recognize that this is a man that has been vetted not only by his local church but also by the universal church and representative of the presbytery, as one who has displayed the gifting and the call and the regeneration and the power of the gospel in his life. It's one who's been transformed by the power of God. Now Paul is one who clearly understood what it meant to take, for this transformation to take place.

See, Paul was once a hater of the gospel. He had heard the message of Jesus. He had heard Stephen preach. He oversaw the persecution and stoning of Stephen as he heard the gospel. He was a persecutor of the church.

He was one who hunted down Christians to have them stoned or drug into prison. But on his way to Damascus, he was struck blind, and he heard a voice saying, Saul, Saul, why did thou persecute me? Recognizing the Lord, his heart was changed by the power of God, the effectual power of God. And he was made the apostle to the Gentiles. Now think about that.

We had a lot of fishermen that were apostles. Fishermen that probably on many occasions associated with Gentiles in the marketplace. But here, the Hebrew of Hebrews, a Pharisee of Pharisees, The Apostle Paul, one who would have referred to Gentiles in his previous state as dogs, unclean, And it's this apostle that God sends to be the apostle to the Gentiles, the people He once hated, He now has given a love for them. The gospel ministry has to be characterized by a love that is not of themselves. It's a love that can only come from Christ Jesus.

A love that comes from the indwelling Christ. A love that allows us to love the unlovely, to look out at the worst of sinners and see a man that's in need of the gospel of grace, The power that transforms, that makes one from a murderer of Christians to a lover. That makes one that's a hater of the Gospel to a lover of the Gospel. One that would say that all his former accomplishments are but dung. It's a humble man.

He also calls himself, in the first part of verse 8 there, the lesser of the apostles, displaying his humility. Now, the word there actually, the way it's written in the text, it says, unto me who am less than the least of all saints. Now it's one word that they have to translate. It's actually a good translation here in the King James Version, but what it's actually saying is is They say probably more little translation, but it's not a word is Leaster He's saying he's He's less than the least of the apostles, which is what we see here. He's saying, you take the apostle that's considered the lowest, and I'm well below him.

He wants them to understand because of his previous life, because of the persecution of the church, because of the stoning of Stephen, because of what he had been, he looked at himself as the least of the apostles. For he was a man with humility, And a man that serves as a minister of the gospel must be a man marked with humility. In 2 Corinthians chapter 12 verses 7 to 10, Paul says, and lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure. For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me. And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness.

Most gladly therefore, I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore, I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong." What Paul is recognizing there is there are things and revelations that he was given that could have the potential to make one proud of what God has revealed to him. But that God had given him a thorn in the flesh to keep him humble. He's recognizing his former pridefulness.

He recognizes what he can be and what he was apart from the grace of God. And He's recognizing that His current conditions, His current sufferings, have a purpose to keep Him Humble. Recognizing that it is in the weakness of man that he is strong. That the gospel comes forth in power through weak men. It says, wherefore I was made a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power.

Unto me who am less than the least of the saints is the grace given that I should preach that I should preach see the office the minute the office of minister is preaching and as I said earlier, the office of deacon is to support this office. In Romans 10, 14 it says, How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? See, the gospel transforms lives.

But what this verse is saying is the gospel must be preached. And people must hear the gospel that it is the venue by which God has chosen to save sinners. And that men that are set apart for gospel ministry are set apart for the preaching of the gospel. So what is the minister called and gifted by the power of God for? For the preaching of the gospel.

And so the second thing I want to look at in this text is the message of the gospel. It says, unto me who am less than the least of all the saints is this grace given that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. That he must preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. I want to start by looking by what the Gospel is not. The Gospel is not preaching current events.

The gospel hasn't changed. The preacher makes modern applications, but it's the same gospel that was preached 2, 000 years ago. It's the same gospel that was preached to the Ephesians. It's still relevant today because the greatest need of man has not changed. Men are sinners in need of a Savior.

The Gospel is not political activism or patriotism. The Gospel affects all these areas. But it's not to be replaced by those. The Gospel should impact politics. The gospel should impact how we are citizens in this nation.

But we don't replace the gospel with messages from the world. The gospel is not even morality or piety. We talk a lot about how people should live and what God's Word teaches us and spiritual disciplines, but so do other faiths. The Muslims are good at this, but it doesn't bring salvation. The Gospel is Christ.

The gospel is not even religion or godliness. See, these things are good things, but these are the outward externals of the gospel. These are the fruit that comes forth. The Gospel applies to current events, but it applies by offering hope where there is none. The Gospel applies to politics, but it applies by offering hope to a system that's broken, to show that God's Word is the standard of righteousness, and that it's only when you trust in Christ Jesus and your heart is changed that you can adhere to the laws of God.

The gospel applies to our morality and our piety, but it's only by the power of the Spirit of Christ in us through the Gospel that we can be moral. The Gospel applies to our religion and our godliness. So what is the Gospel message? We are told here in this passage that it is the unsearchable riches of Christ. See, the essence of the Gospel is Christ and what He gives us.

Now hear me there, I'm not saying that it's the riches and Christ, but that Christ Himself is the unsearchable richest. It is Christ given to us. For those here that were at the ordination, at my ordination, and they remember the charge that was given to me. One of the things that was given to me by Tom Penning was, give them Jesus. And this is what He meant.

Every time one stands in this pulpit, we are to give you the greatest need that you have, and that is Jesus. For He is the unsearchable riches. See, the unsearchable riches of Christ is Him taking on humanity and atoning for our sin and making us a part of the household of God. In Acts 17, 28 it says, For in Him we live and move and have our being, as certain also as your own poets have said, for we are also His offspring." It's Christ in us. That is the unsearchable riches.

See, we are nothing without Christ. We are told that apart from Christ, we can do nothing. The riches are unsearchable, in that no man can obtain them by his own understanding. We are told that to the world the Scriptures are foolishness. It takes the Holy Spirit opening the heart and mind in order to understand the wisdom of God, in order to understand the unsearchable riches that he reveals through Christ Jesus.

We can never fully comprehend the riches of Christ, but they do become increasingly amazing to us. As we understand our condition, as we remember where we came from, just like Paul, a persecutor of the church, and we remember where He saved us from, and what we would be apart from the gospel of grace. That we would be wretched sinners under the wrath of God, condemned to hell for eternity. But because He loved us, He came and He died for us to save us. That is the unsearchable riches.

See, we came to Him Poor and empty handed, but He is all we need. There are people in this world who have everything that money can buy. They have power, but they are without hope. They are but paupers in comparison. There's another place in Hebrews where it compares the sufferings of this world for Christ as being greater than all the treasures that were in Egypt.

Suffering for Christ being better than all the treasures that are in Egypt. See, God allowed the Israelites to plunder the Egyptians when they left, to provide for them. But the greatest thing they had wasn't those treasures they took out of Egypt. The greatest thing they had was Christ. Even then, as the mystery of the gospel was hidden to them, and they had the cloud that represented God with them, they had a pre-incarnate Christ as they looked towards that seed that would save them, that promised seed, that we see in the Proto-Evangelion, Genesis 3.15 where it says that the seed of woman would bruise the head of Satan.

They had a promise that one day one would come and save them and that is the richness of Christ, the unsearchable riches of Christ. Colossians 1.27 says, To whom God would make known, what is the richest of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles? Which is Christ in you, the hope of glory." That is the unsearchable riches. Christ in you, the hope of glory. You have hope and glory.

You understand the unsearchable riches that you have in Christ Jesus? That it's beyond any suffering of this world? When we fix our eyes upon Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, and know that we have the hope of glory, of spending eternity with our Savior. And as we saw, we are a part of the household of God and that familial relationship there. For He is our Lord and Savior, but He is also our brother.

For we are told that He was the firstborn, and that we are made joint heirs with Christ Jesus. We are the adopted sons and daughters of God, joint heirs with Christ Jesus. And we will one day feast in heaven with our Lord and Savior, our friend. For we are told that He is a friend of sinners, and He came and He died for us. What greater love is there than this, but that a man should die for another.

He died for us. He atoned for our sins. He freed us from condemnation and He has given us the unsearchable riches of Himself in dwelling in us. He gives us rest. We are told, come to me all ye who are heavy laden.

He promises rest to those that were leaned back into Jesus. Those who will take His yoke upon them, for it is easy. He gives us peace, a peace that surpasses all understanding. He provides for our needs. We are told that you have not because you ask not.

And that as a father gives good gifts to his son, how much more so will a heavenly father give good gifts to us? Paul said I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Christ was the source of the power that he had. When he stood and he proclaimed the gospel to those who would then drag him out of the city and stone him and leave him for dead, it was by the power of the gospel. When he could boldly preach to the Gentiles and establish churches all over Asia Minor and the known world for he says the gospel was preached to all in his day.

It was by the power of God that he did this, by the power of Christ in him, the one who strengthens him. In 1 Peter, we read, it says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lovelily hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that faith is not away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time." See, we have that lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, an inheritance that's incorruptible. That's speaking of those unsearchable riches of Christ, that treasures that never rust, never fadeth away, reserved in heaven for you. For We are told that He must go to send us a helper, and that He's building a place for us to receive us one day. And we are told that there are treasures in heaven reserved for us that are kept by the power of God through faith.

For we are kept by the power of God unto our salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time. You know, the writer of Amazing Grace, John Newton, knew something about the Gospel of Grace. I know most people already know the story, but I just love the story of a man as a young man he grew up or he spent time on a slave ship. Eventually worked his way up to be a captain of one of those ships. And this was the kind of slave ship that went out and these weren't plantation slaves.

These were slaves that were captured and kept in chains. These are the kind of slaves that when you ran out of provisions or there was danger in the storm and you needed light in the load, they would tie a weight to him and cast some overboard to lighten the load of the ship. They reviewed his property. And he was a man that served on a ship like that. See, the gospel of Christ Jesus, of the unsearchable riches of Christ, transformed his heart and changed him to a new man.

But he never lost sight of where he came from. God made him a gospel minister, called him to be a preacher of the gospel, but he never lost sight of where God had called him from. And when he penned his hymn that's so famous, Amazing Grace, I think sometimes we are so familiar with it that we sing the words without really making the connection there. But he clearly lays out exactly what we see here in this text. He says, amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.

He never lost sight that he was a wretch. Just as Paul said, wretched men that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? Apart from the grace of God, we are all wretched men. He said, I was blind. I was lost, but now am found.

I was blind, but now I see. He recognized that even though he had worked himself up from a deckhand to a captain of a ship, that he was lost. He had no direction. He had no hope in this world. He was blind, he could not see the truth.

But Christ Jesus came, transformed his heart, and he now was found. He now had a direction, he now had hope, he now could see. He says, "'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear." He had become a man that was so vile that there wasn't anything he feared. To be a captain of a slave ship, you have to exercise an authority over harsh men. And he had learned to put away the fears of this world, but there was one fear that he did not understand, and that was, it taught his heart to fear the wrath of God.

And grace, my fears relieved. So when he came under the hand of the wrath of God, when his eyes were opened to his condition, and that he was damned for hell, it was then the same grace that relieved those fears. It says, how precious did that grace appear the hour I first believed. It was an immediate rolling away of that guilt for his sin. It was like Christian when that great burden was taken off his back.

Through many dangers, tolls, and snares, we have already come. It was grace that brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home. Just as Paul was talking about his current afflictions and how they keep him humble, he's recognizing that even with these dangerous tolls and snares, that God, the grace of God, would continue to bring him safely through as they have already. He says, the Lord has promised good to me. His word, my hope, secures.

He will, my shield, and portion be as long as life endures. See, God's Word is full of promises for us, for we are the household of God. And all of the promises of God's Word apply to us. He has promised to make us a great people, For He has taken a people from every nation of the world and He's making a new humanity no longer tied to the nation of Israel but of the household of God. Those who are spiritually indwelt by Christ Jesus, those who are the temple of God.

He will my shield and portion be as long as life endures. For Christ is our shield, is our portion. He protects us. We are under the sovereign hand of God because we are His children. And when we have been there 10, 000 years, bright shining as the sun, we know less days to sing God's praise than when we first begun.

He's saying that no matter how long we are in eternity, we will never plumb the depths of the unsearchable riches of Christ. There will be no end to them. They will go on for eternity and eternity. It will be an eternity of discovering the riches of Christ. For we are the most blessed of all people if you are in the household of God.

So do you know anything of this amazing grace that he speaks of? Do you possess the unsearchable riches of Christ that this text presents as the gospel of Christ? If not, turn to Jesus. Trust in Jesus in His finished work. For when He went to the cross, He died for the past, present, and future sins.

And we are told in Romans 10, 9 that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and thou shalt believe in thy heart that God has raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." Confess with your mouth, Jesus, that He's Lord of your life. That you submit to Him, that you've taken on His yoke, and believe in your heart that He's been raised from the dead. For our future resurrection is based upon the resurrection of Christ, For He is the firstborn of many brethren. And thou shalt be saved. Thou shalt possess the unsearchable riches of Christ.

This is the gospel message. This is the message that transforms our cities. That transforms our state and our nation. If you look back at the history of this nation, you will see that there's been a couple of points of transformation, and they always came through Gospel preaching. Through men standing in pulpits, proclaiming the Word of God, and entire communities transformed.

It's gospel preaching that transforms. It's gospel preaching that gives us godly men to serve in the civil government. It's gospel preaching that brings about the blessings of God when a nation turns back to Him and humbles themselves. And as a nation we can once again pray. And God can do it again.

He's done it a couple of times in our history and I pray that He would do it again in our lifetime. Let's go again to the Lord in prayer. Heavenly Father, we come before You. Father, we thank You for the Word that You've given us. We thank You that You've given us the Gospel of Christ Jesus with the unsearchable riches of Christ, knowing that you have set men apart to be gospel ministers, to preach the gospel, to transform lives.

And Father, I pray that you would use this church in a great way to take the gospel out to the world and that you would use us to transform our communities by gospel preaching. And Father we come before you and we pray in the precious name of our Savior. Amen.