Eph. i. 20 — 23. He raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all prin- cipality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come : and hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the Church, which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.
LITTLE do men imagine what power is necessary to effect the salvation of their souls. They are ready to suppose that they can repent, and turn to God, of themselves, by the force of their own resolutions. But the creation itself was not more the product of a Divine power, than the new creation is in the souls of men. Yea, if we can conceive that any one thing needs a greater exertion of omnipotence than another, it is this. The Apostle strongly expresses this idea in the passage before us. He is praying for the Ephesian converts, that they may have just and ade- quate notions of the power that has been exercised towards them, in bringing them to their present state. Overwhelmed, as it were, with the thought, he accumulates all the most forcible terms that lan- guage could afford him, in order to convey some faint idea of the subject : and then he illustrates the point by the most stupendous effort of omnipotence that ever was exhibited since the foundation of the world ; namely, by the raising of the Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, and the investing of him with all power, both in heaven and earth.
In contemplating this work of omnipotence, the exaltation of Christ upon his Father's throne, we shall fix our attention upon two things :
I. His supremacy above all creatures —
The death, the resurrection, and the ascension of our Lord Jesus, we pass over in silence. It is not the act of our Saviour's elevation, but the state to