Accepted in the Beloved

Updated: Thu, 01/21/2021 - 11:20 By admin

To the praise of the glory of his grace,
wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
Ephesians 1:6KJV

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ACCEPTED IN THE BELOVED - "Are there grander words in any language than these four? There seems to be a sacred poem in these words. To my heart, there is more heavenly music in those four words than in any oratorio I ever heard" (C H Spurgeon). O, the joy of knowing we are forever ACCEPTED by the Most High God! Wondrous declaration! Blessed state! The moment we repent and believe in Christ, God makes us completely, fully ACCEPTED IN THE BELOVED, His beloved Son with Whom He is well pleased (Mt 3:17). And because we are in Him, O amazing grace, God is also well pleased with us! Webster says that to ACCEPT means to receive willingly, to regard with approval, to value, to esteem, to take pleasure in or to receive with favor. And so in Ephesians 1:6KJV Paul is saying in essence that the Father has ACCEPTED us willingly, with approval, with value, with esteem, with delight, not because we have in any way merited His approval, but because His Beloved paid the price in full for our approval (Jn 19:30). This glorious truth became our present reality the moment we were "justified (declared righteous) as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus," His Beloved Son (Ro 3:24). At that moment we were transferred from our former position in Adam, to our new, eternal position in Christ, the Beloved, in Whom we are unconditionally ACCEPTED by the Father (cf 2Cor 5:17, 1Cor 15:22, Col 1:13). O glorious truth, that while we could never stand accepted before God outside of Christ, the moment we stand clothed in His righteousness, we can never be "unaccepted" by our Father! Dear child of God, do you believe "how great a love the Father has bestowed on" you (1Jn 3:1), so that now in the Beloved you are so near and dear to His heart that He also calls you His "BELOVED"? (Ro 1:7, 1Th 1:4) Do you believe that the Father loves you with the same love with which He loves His BELOVED? (Read Jn 17:23) Selah! (Pause and ponder your privileged position - cf Song 2:16). Or do you think you are less accepted by Him because you have strayed into sin or that you are more accepted because of your good behavior or "good works"? While our sins do disrupt our fellowship and communion with God (and call forth His Fatherly discipline, Heb 12:5-11), they do not disrupt our union with His Son, in Whom we are immutably, eternally ACCEPTED. So this begs the question Spurgeon once posed to his congregation "Can you put your hand upon our heart, and say, “I may not be accepted by my fellow-creatures, I may not be acknowledged by them; and, certainly, before my God, I can never be accepted in myself; but in the Beloved, clothed with His righteousness, and standing in His Person, as a member of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones, I am ‘ACCEPTED IN THE BELOVED'?"

As one brave saint presented the Gospel to a precious soul, she responded by saying she had tried her best to please God, but added "I'm afraid God will never accept me." The faithful witness replied "I agree with you. He never will," which prompted a look of astonishment on the woman's face at his seemingly harsh pronouncement! The saint went on to explain "No, He never will. BUT GOD (O those precious words "But God", Eph 2:4,5) has accepted His Son, and if you accept Him by faith, you will find God's acceptance which you desire!" Many people have been deceived into thinking they must somehow earn acceptance in the eyes of God. The message is simple - God accepts all who accept His Son by grace through faith! "In the Beloved accepted am I, Risen, ascended, and seated on high; Saved from all sin thro' His infinite grace, With the redeemed ones accorded a place!" (Martin) Hallelujah!

All heaven declares "Worthy is the Lamb Who was slain" (Rev 5:12). The Worthy One becomes our worth when we enter the New Covenant in His blood (Lk 22:20), a covenant which is solemn and binding and by which we become one with Him, entering into an unbreakable union, a perfect oneness and a complete identification with the Beloved Son of God (Gal 2:20, Col 1:27b, Jn 17:21 cf the "marriage covenant" Ge 2:24b). Let us not wrestle with doubts of our our worth before God. We are worthy, because by grace through faith we are in covenant with our Bridegroom, Christ Jesus, the Worthy One (cf 2Cor 11:2). Beloved, may this truth sink deeply into our souls, freeing us from our need to seek acceptance from God and men based upon our works, and instead resting in the eternal truth of the finished work and worth of Christ that has made us accepted in the Beloved so that we are no longer under condemnation (Ro 8:1) and nothing can "separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Ro 8:39) No condemnation...No separation...in the Beloved! May this great truth motivate us to Spirit filled, Christ exalting, God glorifying righteous, holy lives, knowing that whatever we do, it is because "Christ's love controls us." (2Cor 5:13-14NLT, cf Col 3:23, 24, Rev 19:7,8).

So let me ask you again dearly "BELOVED of God" (Ro 1:7), how is your spiritual state? How do you feel about your standing before God? Whatever your state, may God's Spirit enlighten "the eyes of your heart, so that you may know what is the hope (absolute assurance that God will do good to us in the future) of His calling and what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints" (Eph 1:18), especially what are the riches of the truth that regardless of your present state, your eternal standing is forever "accepted in the Beloved." (Eph 1:6KJV). The verb ACCEPTED (charitoo) is derived from the word for grace (charis) and so could be read more literally "God has be-graced us with His grace in the Beloved." We are veritable trophies of divine grace! As Puritan Thomas Brooks said "God has made us His favorites. God has ingratiated us. He has made us gracious in the Son of His love. Through the blood of Christ, we are lovely and beautiful in God's eyes." "What a healing balm is there in this truth, for a weary, heavy-laden sinner!" (H. Vicars) And Spurgeon reminds us that "accepted in the Beloved" is a "precious doctrine. We are beloved of God (1Jn 3:1). He has great pleasure toward us. He takes a delight in us (cf Zeph 3:17). We are acceptable in His sight. Oh, what a blessing this is! But remember that it is all IN CHRIST. Because Christ is accepted, therefore those who are in Him are accepted." Jesus was FORSAKEN by the Father (Mt 27:46), that we might be ACCEPTED in the Son or as a modern hymn puts it "I'm forgiven, because You were forsaken. I'm accepted, You were condemned. I'm alive and well, Your Spirit is within me." (Amazing Love)

Therefore Octavius Winslow encourages us "Behold your present standing, believer in Christ! Turn your eye away from all your failures, your disobedience, the flaws and imperfections that mark your sincere endeavors to serve Christ and to glorify God and see where your true acceptance is found, even in the Beloved of the Father, "The Lord our Righteousness (Jer 23:6b)." "Accepted in the Beloved," is the record that will raise you above all the fears and despondencies arising from your shortcomings and failures and fill you with peace, and joy, and assurance."

Indeed as Spurgeon explains "ACCEPTED signifies that we are the objects of divine satisfaction, nay, even of divine delight. How marvelous that we, worms, mortals, sinners, should be the objects of divine love! Let this bell ring (Accepted in the Beloved), for therein is a depth of silver sweetness which will make the sanctified ear and heart glad with the fullness of joy. We are today ACCEPTED IN THE BELOVED, today absolved from sin, today innocent in the sight of God. Oh, ravishing, soul-transporting thought! Some clusters of this vine we will not be able to gather until we go to heaven, but this is one of the first ripe clusters, and may be plucked and eaten here. This is not as the corn on the land, which we can never eat until we cross the Jordan. Rather, this is part of the manna in the wilderness and part, too, of our daily raiment with which God supplies us in our journeying here." In explaining our acceptance, H A Ironside says that "the saved sinner does not stand before God in any righteousness of his own, that he does not plead any merit of his own before the divine throne, but that through grace he has been received to the very heart of God. Not merely forgiven, not merely justified, not merely washed from his sins or cleansed from his defilement, but received in loving-kindness to the VERY HEART OF GOD according to the Father’s estimate of His own BELOVED SON." Hallelujah!

Ironside goes on give us a beautiful illustration of our acceptance in the Beloved: "Years ago I was preaching in the small town of Roosevelt, Washington. I was the guest of friends who were sheep-raisers. It was lambing time and every morning we went out to see the lambs—hundreds of them—playing about on the green. One morning I was startled to see an old ewe go loping across the road, followed by the strangest looking lamb I had ever beheld. It apparently had six legs, and the last two were hanging helplessly as though paralyzed, and the skin seemed to be partially torn from its body in a way that made me feel the poor little creature must be suffering terribly. But when one of the herders caught the lamb and brought it over to me, the mystery was explained. That lamb did not really belong originally to that ewe. She had a lamb which was bitten by a rattlesnake and died. This lamb that I saw was an orphan and needed a mother's care. But at first the bereft ewe refused to have anything to do with it. She sniffed at it when it was brought to her, then pushed it away, saying as plainly as a sheep could say it, "That is not our family odor!" So the herders skinned the lamb that had died and very carefully drew the fleece over the living lamb. This left the hind-leg coverings dragging loose. Thus covered, the lamb was brought again to the ewe. She smelled it once more and this time seemed thoroughly satisfied and adopted it as her own. It seemed to me to be a beautiful picture of the grace of God to sinners. We are all outcasts and have no claim upon His love. But God's own Son, the "Lamb of God, that takes away the sin of the World," (Jn 1:29) has died for us and now we who believe are dressed up in the fleece of the Lamb Who died (cf Isa 61:10). Thus, GOD HAS ACCEPTED US IN HIM, and "there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." (Ro 8:1) We are as dear to the heart of the Father as His own holy, spotless Son."

"Near, so very near to God, Nearer I could not be; For in the Person of His Son, I’m just as near as He. Dear, so very dear to God, Dearer I could not be; For in the person of His Son, I’m just as dear as He." Glory!

We are now and forever the "beloved of God" because we have been "accepted in the Beloved." Praise the Lord. Let me encourage you be still and know that He is God (Ps 46:10) and listen to the the words of the beautiful song "My Beloved" as if they are sung to your heart from the heart of your Father, for you are forever His beloved in His BELOVED. Amen

My Beloved - Kari Jobe - YouTube

MISCELLANEOUS NOTES & QUOTES
ON "ACCEPTED IN THE BELOVED"

God see us as God sees Him. And, God's name for His own dear children is His special people, and we are beloved.

Alan Carr - We used to be on God's hit list, so to speak, but now, we are on His list of favorites! This means that God is literally pleased with us! A lot of Christians waste a lot of time trying to do what Jesus did when He died on the cross - please the Father! (⇒ The Father is pleased with me, because I wear the righteousness of Christ. What a blessing!)

As Spurgeon said "Some Christians seem to be accepted in their own experience. When their spirit is lively, and their hopes bright, they think God accepts them, for they feel so heavenly-minded, so drawn above the earth! But when their souls cleave to the dust, they are the victims of the fear that they are no longer accepted. If they could but see that all their high joys do not exalt them, and all their low despondencies do not depress them in their Father’s sight, but that they STAND ACCEPTED in One Who never alters, in One Who is always the Beloved of God, always perfect, always without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, how much more joyful they would be, and how much more they would honor the Saviour! Rejoice then, believer, in this: You are accepted “in the beloved.” You look within, and you say “There is nothing acceptable here!” But look at Christ, and see if there is not everything acceptable there. Your sins trouble you; but God has cast your sins behind His back (Micah 7:19), and you are accepted in the Righteous One. You have had to fight with corruption, and to wrestle with temptation, but you are already accepted in Him Who has overcome the powers of evil. The devil tempts You. Be of good cheer, for he cannot destroy you, for you are accepted in Him Who has bruised Satan’s head (Ge 3:15). Know by full assurance your glorious standing. Even glorified souls are not more accepted than you are. They are only accepted in heaven “in the BELOVED,” and you are even now accepted in Christ after the same manner."

Ephesians 1:6 KJV says our ACCEPTANCE is "To the praise of the glory of His grace." "What a wonderful expression this is,—not only “the glory of His grace,” but the praise of that glory! God has done all things with a view to magnifying His grace in the hearts of the sons and daughters of men. Accepted in the Beloved.” Oh, what honey this is in the mouth, what cheer this is in the heart! Are all of you, dear friends, “accepted in the Beloved”? (CHS) Grace is God's acceptance of me. Faith is my acceptance of God's acceptance of me. God accepts me in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now the Father sees every saint in His Son, clothed in His righteousness and recipient of the same love with which He loves His own Son! (Cp Jesus' words that the Father "loved them even as" He loved His Beloved Son - Jn 17:23). Jesus is the object of the Father's love and because we are in Christ, we too are the objects of the Father's unconditional love. Amazing grace indeed! And absolutely nothing can "separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Ro 8:39)

"The BELOVED" of course is Jesus of Whom the Father said "This is my BELOVED SON in Whom I am well pleased" (Mt 3:17;17:5). Indeed, "He is Beloved in all His offices to us, Beloved in all His characters, Beloved in the manger, Beloved in the shame and spitting, Beloved on the tree, Beloved on the throne. We cannot think of Him without our heart beginning to beat high and fast." (CHS)

Precious indeed is the truth that God "HATH MADE" the child of God accepted, that redeeming grace has so answered every judgment our sin deserved, and so fully satisfied every stroke divine justice demanded through the merit of Another, so that now the Father sees every saint in the standing of His Son, clothed in His righteousness and recipient of the same love with which He loves His own Son! (Cp Jesus' words that the Father "loved them even as" He loved His Beloved Son - Jn 17:23). We are accepted in the Beloved and are objects of God’s highest plans and tenderest love, the same love with which He loves His Beloved Son! In Jesus' prayer He prays that believers "may be perfected in unity, that the world may know that Thou didst send Me, and didst LOVE THEM, even as Thou didst LOVE ME. (John 17:23) Jesus is the object of the Father's love and because we are in Christ, we too are the objects of the Father's tender love. Amazing grace indeed! And nothing can "separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Ro 8:39) It is therefore only fitting that such a measureless accomplishment should redound "to the praise of the glory of His grace"!

Would it comfort us to think the Father loved us, and was well pleased with us? If we believe in Jesus—he does love us, and is well pleased with us for his sake! All believers are "accepted in the beloved!" What sweet words are those! They have sustained the people of God in a dying hour. How could any man bear the thought of entering God's presence, were it not for the assurance that the Father will receive him in the name of his own beloved Son

Spurgeon encourages us to recall to mind the truth that "I am accepted in the Beloved. "I have my sorrows and griefs, I have my aches and pains, and weaknesses, but I must not be discontent, for God accepts me. Ah me! How one can laugh at griefs when this sweet word comes in, “accepted in the Beloved.” I may be blind, but I am “accepted in the Beloved:” I may be lame, I may be poor, I may be despised, I may be persecuted, I may have much to put up with in many ways, but really these troubles of the flesh count for little or nothing to me since I am “accepted in the Beloved.” Is not this a word to die with? We will meet death and face his open jaws with this word, “Accepted in the Beloved.” Will not this be a word to rise with amidst the blaze of the great judgment day? God’s love of His dear Son covers all believers, as a canopy covers all who come beneath it. (cf Isa 4:5b) As a hen covers her chickens with her wings, so God’s love to Christ covers all the children of promise (Gal 4:28). As the sun shining forth from the gates of the morning gilds all the earth with golden splendor, so this great love of God to the Well-Beloved, streaming forth to Him, enlightens all who are in Him. God is so boundlessly pleased with Jesus that in Him He is altogether well pleased with us."

Accepted in the Beloved means that God loves us in spite of our failures. As A W Pink says, this truth "goes deeper and means far more than “accepted through Him.” It denotes not merely a recommendatory passport from Christ, but a real union with Him, whereby we are incorporated into His mystical body, and made as truly partakers of His righteousness as the members of the physical body partake of the life which animates its head." O, that the Spirit of Christ would enable us to grasp even a small measure of this life transforming truth. Octavius Winslow said "Behold your present standing, believer in Christ! Turn your eye away from all your failures, your disobedience, the flaws and imperfections that mark your sincere endeavors to serve Christ and to glorify God and see where your true acceptance is found, even in the Beloved of the Father, "The Lord our Righteousness." "Accepted in the Beloved," is the record that will raise you above all the fears and despondencies arising from your shortcomings and failures and fill you with peace, and joy, and assurance." Wayne Barber adds God's acceptance of us in the Beloved, frees us "from the attitude of feeling we have to do more to be accepted by God. We are free from that performance mentality because we are accepted in the Beloved. This truth sets us free from feeling like we have to measure up to a certain standard. We are free from that works mentality because Jesus measured up for us when He declared "It is finished." (Jn 19:30) We are free from having to try to live like Jesus. Have you ever tried to live like Jesus? We are free from that because now the Beloved seeks to live His life in and through us (Col 3:4, Gal 2:20). We are free to be what He has designed us to be. Everything God demanded of our lives we are now free in Him to meet those demands in His power. He lives in us to live His life through us."

Accepted in the Beloved is a positional truth which calls for a practical response. Spurgeon says that "You will begin your new career accepted in the Beloved, with a life within you that can never die, and with a pardon granted to you that can never be reversed. You shall be so completely saved that you shall never return to the old follies and sins in which you formerly lived, because you will not be saved because somebody has persuaded you to live in a different fashion, but because you have been made a new creature altogether (2Cor 5:17)." John Piper adds "now that you are accepted in the Beloved—justified by faith alone—the Holy Spirit goes to work on you, and you start to become in practice what you are in Christ. And thus the pilgrim principle is unleashed: You must change. You cannot be at home in your present condition. “If then you have been raised with Christ…Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth” (Col 3:1–2). Justification and sanctification—in that order—are the root of the indigenous/pilgrim tension. We are righteous in Christ—indigenous, at home. Now we must become what we are—the pilgrim must make progress." Indeed, God does not change us in order that He may love us, but He loves us and accepts us in the Beloved in order that He might change us into the likeness of His Beloved.

Where am I? I am in Christ. And, if I'm in Christ, I am rich in my person. When God looks at Jesus, He sees me. When God looks at me, He sees Jesus. You may not believe that, but it is true. As Spurgeon reminds us "You are accepted at this moment, but you are not justified because you feel in a sweet frame of mind or because your heart rejoices in the Name of God. Oh, no!" We are accepted in the Beloved not according to our faithfulness, not according to our zeal or devotion, but according to our Father's thoughts concerning His Beloved Son. "Beloved in God the Father" (Jude 1), are you resting in the truth that you are accepted in the Beloved and so you can rest from your striving to gain acceptance with the Father? We have no worthiness in ourselves, but find all our worthiness IN CHRIST. "In Christ alone my Hope is found. He alone is my light, my strength, my song. Firm through the fiercest drought and storm. What heights of love. What depths of peace. When fears are stilled, When strivings cease. My Comforter, my all All in All. Here in the love of Christ I stand....No guilt of life. No fear of death. This is the power of Christ in me." Beloved, we stand forever "accepted in the Beloved."

The hymn says "I'm forgiven, because You were forsaken. I'm accepted, You were condemned. I'm alive and well, Your Spirit is within me. Because You died and rose again. Amazing Love, how can it be, That You, my King should die for me? Amazing Love, I know it's true. It's my joy to honor You in all I do to honor You." (Amazing Love)

Jesus gave His life for us at Calvary, that He might now give His life to us.

Jon Courson - We are accepted because we’re in the Beloved—we’re in Christ. It doesn’t matter how you feel about yourself. You don’t have to take your spiritual temperature hour by hour. You don’t have to wonder, ‘Am I hot? Am I cold? How am I doing?’ You won’t have to go through the kind of introspection which will inevitably set you up for spiritual depression if you understand the simple principle that you are embraced not because of who you are, but because of where you are. Where are you? You’re in Christ. And once you accept this truth, you will enjoy your relationship with the Father in a brand new way. You’ll throw away your spiritual thermometer; you’ll quit analyzing how you’re doing; and you’ll rejoice that you are simply, totally, wonderfully in Christ. (A Day's Journey)

Our sin will cause us to lose the sweetness of fellowship and communion with the Father, but our acceptance with God never changes, because His acceptance is not on the basis of anything we have done. He accepts us for Christ's sake. The only way we could become "unaccepted" is if God were to reject His own Son, for we are immutably in Christ, identified with Him, in union with Him, in oneness with Him by the indissoluble new covenant in His blood. O, blessed security of the glorious truth that God has "made us acceptable in the Beloved," in spite of times of faithlessness and failure, a truth that redounds to the "praise of the glory of His grace!"

We see pictures of the Father's unconditional acceptance of us in His Beloved in the OT where David accepts Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan (2Sa 9:6) based on his desire to show kindness to any left of the house of Saul (2Sa 9:3) and in the NT where we see in Philemon where Paul says "if he has wronged you in any way, or owes you anything, charge that to my account." (Philemon 1:18) All our debts have been paid in full by our Beloved! We see a picture of this acceptance in the Prodigal son's return home (Lk 15:11-32, 20) - "And he got up and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him, and felt compassion for him, and ran and embraced him, and kissed him." 22 "But the father said to his slaves, 'Quickly bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet; 23 and bring the fattened calf, kill it, and let us eat and be merry;

He is the Beloved of his saints, who are still wayfaring and warfaring here below.

Spurgeon adds that "If we are “accepted in the Beloved,” then our persons are accepted: we ourselves are well pleasing to Him. God looks upon us now with pleasure. Being ourselves accepted, the right of access to Him is given us (Ro 5:1-2). When a person is accepted with God he may come to God when he chooses. He is one of these courtiers who may come even to the royal throne and meet with no rebuff. No chamber of our great Father’s house is closed against us; no blessing of the covenant is withheld from us; no sweet smile of the Father’s face is refused us. And, being accepted ourselves, our prayers are also accepted (Heb 4:16, 10:19-22). Children of God, can you sincerely believe this? When God delights in men He gives them the desires of their hearts.

So dear, so very dear to God,
More dear I cannot be;
The love wherewith He loves His Son,
Such is His love to me.
So near, so very near to God,
Nearer I could not be,
For in the person of His Son,
I am as near as He.

Spurgeon's Morning and Evening - “Accepted in the beloved.” — Ephesians 1:6 - What a state of privilege! It includes our justification before God, but the term “acceptance” in the Greek means more than that. It signifies that we are the objects of divine complacence (satisfaction), nay, even of divine delight. How marvelous that we, worms, mortals, sinners, should be the objects of divine love! But it is only “in the beloved.” Some Christians seem to be accepted in their own experience, at least, that is their apprehension. When their spirit is lively, and their hopes bright, they think God accepts them, for they feel so high, so heavenly-minded, so drawn above the earth! But when their souls cleave to the dust, they are the victims of the fear that they are no longer accepted. If they could but see that all their high joys do not exalt them, and all their low despondencies do not really depress them in their Father’s sight, but that they stand accepted in One who never alters, in One who is always the beloved of God, always perfect, always without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, how much happier they would be, and how much more they would honour the Saviour! Rejoice then, believer, in this: thou art accepted “in the beloved.” Thou lookest within, and thou sayest, “There is nothing acceptable here!” But look at Christ, and see if there is not everything acceptable there. Thy sins trouble thee; but God has cast thy sins behind his back, and thou art accepted in the Righteous One. Thou hast to fight with corruption, and to wrestle with temptation, but thou art already accepted in him who has overcome the powers of evil. The devil tempts thee; be of good cheer, he cannot destroy thee, for thou art accepted in him who has broken Satan’s head. Know by full assurance thy glorious standing. Even glorified souls are not more accepted than thou art. They are only accepted in heaven “in the beloved,” and thou art even now accepted in Christ after the same manner.

Spurgeon - Mark here the channel through which all God’s mercies run. Jesus Christ is the channel through which grace flows to us; we are chosen in him; we are adopted by Jesus Christ to himself; and we are “accepted in the Beloved.” It is said of that eminently holy man, Harington Evans, that, when near death, he asked his friends to give this message to his church. “Tell them,” said he, “I am accepted in the Beloved.” Can we say, my brethren, that we are accepted in the Beloved? Can we put our hand upon our heart, and each one say, “I may not be accepted by my fellow-creatures, I may not be acknowledged by them; and, certainly, before my God, I can never be accepted in myself; but in the Beloved, clothed with his righteousness, and standing in his person, as a member of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones, I am ‘accepted in the Beloved’ ”?

Rob Hayward's song I'm accepted, I'm forgiven relevant lyrics...

I’m accepted, I’m forgiven,
I am fathered by the true and living God.
I’m accepted, no condemnation,
I am loved by the true and living God.
There’s no guilt or fear as I draw near
To the Saviour and Creator of the world.
There is joy and peace as I release
My worship to you, O Lord.

I'm Accepted - DeGarmo & Key - YouTube

I may not be rich
Don't wear fashion clothes
Don't live in a mansion
Don't have much that shows
Never won a contest in popularity
Don't have much to offer
But Jesus loves me
I'm accepted, accepted
I'm accepted by the One who matters most

Never set a record in sports agility
Never was magnetic in personality
That don't really matter
I'll do the best I can
'Cause there's a God above me
Who loves me like I am
I'm accepted, accepted
I'm accepted by the One who matters most

If you think you're a loser
When you fail it seems at everything you do
Just remember there's a Savior
And you are worth enough
He gave His life for you
I'm accepted, accepted
I'm accepted by the One who matters most

Your acceptance is all in your great Surety; and if it could be possible that he and the entire system of his grace could be withdrawn, and covenant engagements abrogated, you would be as unacceptable as even lost spirits are, and would be like them, for ever driven from the face and favor of God. Is He not, then, as your accepted Substitute, at this hour most precious to you?

Spurgeon on Accepted in the Beloved - There are many locks in my house, and all with different keys; but I have one master-key which opens all. So the Lord has many treasuries and secrets, all shut up from carnal minds with locks which they cannot open; but he who walks in fellowship with Jesus possesses the master-key which will admit him to all the blessings of the covenant; yea, to the very heart of God. Through the Well-beloved we have access to God, to heaven, to every secret of the Lord.

Spurgeon encourages us to recall "I am accepted in the Beloved. May not each believer talk thus with himself--I have my sorrows and griefs, I have my aches and pains, and weaknesses, but I must not be discontent, for God accepts me. Ah me! How one can laugh at griefs when this sweet word comes in, “accepted in the Beloved.” I may be blind, but I am “accepted in the Beloved:” I may be lame, I may be poor, I may be despised, I may be persecuted, I may have much to put up with in many ways, but really these troubles of the flesh count for little or nothing to me since I am “accepted in the Beloved.” Is not this a word to die with? We will meet death and face his open jaws with this word, “Accepted in the Beloved.” Will not this be a word to rise with amidst the blaze of the great judgment day? God’s love of His dear Son covers all believers, as a canopy covers all who come beneath it. (cf Isa 4:5b) As a hen covers her chickens with her wings, so God’s love to Christ covers all the children of promise (Gal 4:28). As the sun shining forth from the gates of the morning gilds all the earth with golden splendor, so this great love of God to the Well-Beloved, streaming forth to Him, enlightens all who are in Him. God is so boundlessly pleased with Jesus that in Him He is altogether well pleased with us."

Much went before this, but, oh, what a morning without clouds rose upon us when we knew our acceptance and were assured thereof. Acceptance was the watchword, and had troops of angels met us we should have rejoiced that we were as blest as they. Understand that this acceptance comes to us entirely as a work of God--“He hath made us accepted in the Beloved.” We never made ourselves acceptable, nor could we have done so, but He that has made us first in creation, has now made us new by His grace, and so has made us accepted in the Beloved. That this was an act of pure grace there can be no doubt, for the verse runs thus, “Wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved,” that is, in His grace. There was no reason in ourselves why we should have been put into Christ, and so accepted; the reason lay in the heart of the Eternal Father Himself.

As you read these words may Spurgeon's prayer be your prayer and your experience - "I desire that you may experientially enjoy the precious drop of honey from the Rock Christ Jesus which is contained in the four words-Accepted in the Beloved. Oh that the Holy Spirit may make you enter into the treasures which these words contain!"

J Vernon McGee - 1John 2:29 reads: “If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness is born of him.” It is one thing to testify that we know Christ and are in Him; it is quite another to have a life that reveals that He is our righteousness. It is wonderful to know positionally that we are in Christ and that we are accepted in the Beloved, but it is altogether different to have a life down here that is commensurate with that. John is telling us that the way we recognize other believers is by their lives and not by their lips. Righteousness is a family characteristic of the Father and His children. God’s children take after their Father—they have His characteristics.

The favorable reception of someone or something. God in his grace accepts human beings, their worship and their offerings. People are called to accept Jesus Christ and the message of the gospel and to respond to being accepted by accepting one another.

Our relationship with God is one of acceptance, not merely that we have accepted God in Christ, but that He has made us accepted in the Beloved, in Christ Alone. Indeed, since Jesus is the Beloved Son, the Son of His love, what is true about Him is true about us.

Spurgeon - Can we get a step farther? Will the Holy Spirit help us while I say a few words by way of enlargement?

1. If we are “accepted in the Beloved,” then, first, our persons are accepted: we ourselves are well pleasing to Him. God looks upon us now with pleasure.

2. Being ourselves accepted, the right of access to Him is given us. When a person is accepted with God he may come to God when he chooses. He is one of these courtiers who may come even to the royal throne and meet with no rebuff. No chamber of our great Father’s house is closed against us; no blessing of the covenant is withheld from us; no sweet smile of the Father’s face is refused us.

3. And, being accepted ourselves, our prayers are also accepted. Children of God, can you sincerely believe this? When God delights in men He gives them the desires of their hearts.

4. It follows, as a pleasant sequence, that our gifts are accepted, for those who are accepted with God find a great delight in giving of their substance to the glory of His name. Then let us try what we can do for Him. Here is a great lump of quartz, but if the Lord can see a grain of gold, He will save the quartz for the sake of it. He says, “Destroy it not, for a blessing is in it.” I do not mean that the Lord deals thus with all men. It is only for accepted men that He has this kind way of accepting their gifts. Had you seen me, when a young man, and an usher, walking through the streets with rolls of drawings from a boys’ school, you would have guessed that I considered them of no value and fit only to be consigned to the fire; but I always took a great interest in the drawings of my own boy, and I still think them rather remarkable. You smile, I dare say, but I do so think, and my judgment is as good as yours. I value them because they are his, and I think I see budding genius in every touch, but you do not see it because you are so blind. I see it since love has opened my eyes. God can see in His people’s gifts to Him and their works for Him a beauty which no eyes but His can perceive. Oh, if He so treats our poor service, what ought we not to do for Him? What zeal, what alacrity should stimulate us! If we are ourselves accepted our sacrifices shall be acceptable.

Harry Ironside on the response of one who is "begraced with amazing grace" (as are all who are accepted in the Beloved) - You may remember the case of the woman who attempted the assassination of Queen Elizabeth. She was dressed as a man page, and had secreted herself in the queen’s boudoir awaiting the convenient moment to stab her to death, not realizing that the queen’s attendants would be very careful to search the rooms before her majesty was permitted to retire. Hidden there among the gowns they found this woman and brought her into the presence of the queen. They took from her the poniard which she had hoped to plant in the heart of her sovereign. She realized that her case, humanly speaking, was hopeless, and so she threw herself down on her knees and pleaded and begged the queen as a woman, to have compassion upon her, a woman, her intended assassin, and to show her grace. Queen Elizabeth looked at her quietly, and coolly said, “If I show you grace, what promise will you make for the future?” The woman looked up and said, “Grace that hath conditions, grace that is fettered by precautions, is no grace at all.” Queen Elizabeth caught it in a moment and said, “You are right; I pardon you of my grace,” and they led her away a free woman. History tells us that from that moment Queen Elizabeth had no more faithful devoted servant than that woman who had intended to take her life.

Ironside goes on to mention different translations of Eph 1:6 and concludes "all these different renderings suggest just exactly the same thing, that the saved sinner does not stand before God in any righteousness of his own, that he does not plead any merit of his own before the divine throne, but that through grace he has been received to the very heart of God. Not merely forgiven, not merely justified, not merely washed from his sins or cleansed from his defilement, but received in loving-kindness to the very heart of God according to the Father’s estimate of His own beloved Son. In the seventeenth chapter of John our blessed Lord speaks to the Father of His own, of you and of me, if we have believed in Him, for He was praying for those “who shall believe on Me through their word.” Thus He included all believers to the very end of time, and speaking of such He says to the Father, “That the world may know that Thou hast loved them, as Thou hast loved Me.” I could not believe that if it were not in my Bible; I could not believe that God, the Holy One, loves me a poor sinner in myself, a poor sinner who never retires at night without having to lift my heart to Him in penitence and confess my failures, as He loves the Lord Jesus Christ, His holy, spotless Son."

We are “accepted in the beloved” (Eph. 1:6); we “love him because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19); “we are more than conquerors through him that loved us” (Rom. 8:37).

In Romans 1, Paul reminds those called as saints that they are "beloved of God." (Ro 1:7)

In his first letter to the saints in Thessalonica, he reminded the brethren that they are "beloved by God." (1Thes 1:4)

In Philippians he reminded the saints that they are all "you all are partakers of grace with" him. (Phil 1:7)

1Thes 2:13 And for this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received from us the word of God’s message, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.

Chafer - Hence, every believer is now said to be sanctified positionally, holy, and by so much a saint before God. This position bears no relationship to the believer’s daily experience more than that it should inspire him to holy living. His position in Christ is, to be sure, according to the Scriptures, the greatest possible incentive to holiness of life. The great doctrinal Epistles observe this order in teaching the truth. They first state the marvels of saving grace and then conclude with an appeal for a life corresponding to the divinely wrought position (cf. Rom. 12:1; Eph. 4:1; Col. 3:1). Christians are not now accepted in themselves; they are accepted in the Beloved. They are not now righteous in themselves; He has been made unto them righteousness.

Now the God of peace, Who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord, equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

What is acceptable sacrifice to God? The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. A broken and a contrite heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise. (Ps 51:17)

Divine acceptance - God’s gracious favor shown both to Israel and to the Gentiles. God accepts people who respond to him, and worship that is offered sincerely and is accompanied by wholehearted commitment.

Beloved (CHS) - He is Beloved in all his offices to us, Beloved in all his characters, Beloved in the manger, Beloved in the shame and spitting, Beloved on the tree, Beloved on the throne. We cannot think of him without our heart beginning to beat high and fast.... He is the Beloved of his saints, who are still wayfaring and warfaring here below. To him their highest affections gather. He is dearer to them than all besides, “the chief among ten thousand, and the altogether lovely.”...Of all the titles that tare given to Christ, there may be some that excel in splendor, and others in sublimity; but surely this is among the chief for sweetness and expressiveness. It hath the finger which toucheth our heart strings. “The Beloved.”...It will delight you if you try in meditation to get a hold of this thought, of how infinitely acceptable Christ must be to God the Father. All other forms of acceptance must have their limit and boundary; but the acceptability of the Son of God to the First Person of the Blessed Trinity must be altogether beyond either bottom or shore.

In Jesus we "fit in" as Alan Carr phrases "accepted in the Beloved."

ACCEPTABLE

meditation of my heart be a Ps 19:14

no prophet is a in his hometown. Lk 4:24

holy and a to God, which is Rom 12:1

what is good and a and perfect. Rom 12:2

thus let us offer to God a Heb 12:28

to offer spiritual sacrifices a 1 Pt 2:5

to be a it must be perfect; Lv 22:21

Lev 22:21 ‘And when a man offers a sacrifice of peace offerings to the LORD to fulfill a special vow, or for a freewill offering, of the herd or of the flock, it must be perfect to be accepted; there shall be no defect in it.

God’s acceptance of human beings

God’s gracious acceptance of Israel 2Ki 13:23 See also Eze 20:40-41; Ro 11:1

God’s acceptance of those who respond to him Ge 4:7; Eze 43:27; Jn 6:37 See also Ex 28:38; Ro 14:3; Heb 12:6; 2Pe 1:10-11

God’s acceptance of the Gentiles Ro 15:16 See also Isa 56:6-7; Ac 10:34-35; 15:7-8

Prayers for acceptance by God Dt 21:8; 2Sa 24:23

God’s acceptance of human worship

Acceptable sacrifices Lev 22:19-21; 1Pe 2:5 See also Lev 1:3-4; 19:5-7; 22:27-29; Mal 3:3-4; Jn 4:23; Ro 12:1; Php 4:18; Heb 12:28; 13:16

Acceptance of gifts offered for the tabernacle Nu 7:5 See also Nu 31:51-54

Unacceptable offerings Jer 14:10-12 See also Lev 7:18; 22:25; Mal 1:8-10; 2:13

Acceptable service Pr 21:3; Jas 1:27 See also 1Sa 15:22; Ps 51:6-7; Jer 6:19-20; Am 5:21-24; 2Co 6:17-18; Isa 52:11

God accepts prayer and praise Ps 6:9; Heb 13:15 See also Job 33:26; 42:8-9; Ps 119:108; Lk 18:13-14

Jesus Christ is the type of perfect acceptance (Mk 1:11 ||, He 10:5ff.). In Him as ‘the Beloved,’ and through Him as the Mediator, men secure their religious standing and fundamental acceptance with God (Eph 1:6). In serving Him (Ro 14:18), and following His example (1 P 2:20, 21), they become morally acceptable in the Father’s sight.

Can I depend on God’s acceptance? Hebrews 6:13–20 We are accepted by a God who does not change. God also bound himself with an oath, so that those who received the promise could be perfectly sure that he would never change his mind. So God has given us both his promise and his oath. These two things are unchangeable because it is impossible for God to lie. Therefore, we who have fled to him for refuge can take new courage, for we can hold on to his promise with confidence. (Hebrews 6:17–18) God’s two “unchangeable things” are his nature and his promise. God embodies all truth, and he therefore cannot lie. Because God is truth, you can be secure in his promises; you don’t need to wonder if he will change his plans. To the true seeker who comes to God in belief, God gives an unconditional promise of acceptance. When you ask God with openness, honesty, and sincerity to save you from your sins, he will do it. This assurance should give you courage and hope....The good news about Jesus is that he comes to all, including the plain and the ordinary. He comes to anyone with a heart humble enough to accept him. Whoever you are, whatever you do, you can have Jesus in your life. Don’t think you need extraordinary qualifications—he accepts you as you are. (Handbook of Bible Application)

Zondervan Encyclopedia - A term meaning that a person or act is received with approval or welcomed by another. The idea is rendered by a variety of words or expressions in the OT and NT. In the Bible the most vital need of the person is to be acceptable to God. Sin separates. Acceptance is a condition of restoration to God. It is clear that God determines who is acceptable to him, and he it is who provides the means of RECONCILIATION of the estranged. God instituted reconciling sacrifices, but sacrifices in themselves are of no use if the worshipers are profane in their manner of life (Isa. 1:11–16). It was the penitent TAX COLLECTOR and not the self-justifying PHARISEE whom God accepted at prayer (Lk. 18:14). The NT gives the final word on the solution. God provided access to himself through Jesus Christ by his cross (Eph. 2:18; 3:12). Acceptance is, in more personal terms, the equivalent of the idea of JUSTIFICATION, which comes through accepting God’s gift by faith (Rom. 5:1–2) We are accepted by accepting God’s gift. Since this is so, the believer can offer himself acceptably to God (Rom. 12:1). As a priest, his particular sacrifices are acceptable through Christ (1 Pet. 2:5), such as his gifts, his praise, his well-doing, and his sharing (Phil 4:18; Heb. 13:15–16). All the godly of whatever race and station are through Christ acceptable to God, as CORNELIUS was (Acts 10:35). And because God has received believers, they are to forgive and accept each other in the fellowship of love (Eph. 4:32; 5:2), even though they differ on details of Christian conscientious behavior (Rom. 14:1, 3; 15:7 NEB).

Infinity extends to every attribute of God as alluded to in the words of the hymn Accepted in the Beloved...

“In the Beloved” I went to the tree,
There, in His Person, by faith I may see
Infinite wrath rolling over His head,
Infinite grace, for He died in my stead.

Accepted in the Beloved speaks of our justification, of Christ's righteousness imputed to our account by grace through faith.

Other translations render this verse "His glorious grace He favored us with in the Beloved" (HCSB), "His glorious grace with which He has blessed us in the Beloved" (ESV)

Accepted (5487) (charitoo from charis= grace) means to cause one to be the recipient of a benefit. It means to bestow grace or favor upon or to show kindness to someone. Charitoo can also convey the sense of to make one agreeable or possessed of grace. To be sure Paul's use of this verb demonstrates that man can take no credit for this bestowal of grace -- it was unearned and unmerited favor and that is why it was freely bestowed.

Ralph Earle writes that "The verb charitoo comes from the noun charis, "grace." It means "to endow with charis," or "to cause to find favor". The idea here is that God has extended His favor or grace to us in Christ." (Word Meanings in the New Testament)

Thayer says charitoo means to "pursue with grace, compass with favor, to honor with blessings."

Lewis Sperry Chafer comments on "made accepted"...

The student would do well to observe the force of the word made as it appears in a considerable number of passages, where it indicates that the thing accomplished is not wrought by the believer for himself, but is the work of God for him. If he is made something which he was not before, it is evidently the work of another in his behalf. In this instance, the believer is said to be made accepted. He is accepted on the part of God who, because of His infinite holiness, could accept no one less perfect than Himself. All of this is provided for on the basis of the truth that the believer is made accepted “in the beloved” (Eph. 1:6). Without the slightest strain upon His holiness, God accepts those who are in union with His Son; and this glorious fact, that the one who is saved is accepted, constitutes a measureless feature of divine grace. (Systematic Theology)

A W Pink...Accepted in the beloved” goes deeper and means far more than “accepted through Him.” It denotes not merely a recommendatory passport from Christ, but a real union with Him, whereby we are incorporated into His mystical body, and made as truly partakers of His righteousness as the members of the physical body partake of the life which animates its head. (The Divine Covenants)

Pink writes...Every poor sinner who has fled to Him for refuge stands "accepted in the Beloved" (Eph 1:6). Hallelujah!

By nature we were "under the (sentence of) law," but now believers are "under grace" (Ro 6:14). By nature we were "children of wrath" (Eph 2:2), but now we are "accepted in the Beloved" (Eph 1:6). Under the first covenant we were "in Adam" (1Cor 15:22), but now we are "in Christ" (Ro 8:1). As believers in Christ we have everlasting life, and because of this we "shall not come into condemnation." (Comfort for Christians)

Such a one has been accepted in the Beloved, accorded a standing before God which neither the Law nor Satan can challenge, and made nearer and dearer to God than are the holy angels. Tell such a one that something else is still required from him, before God can regard him with approbation—that the redemption of Christ must be added to, by his own good works—and he rejects such an aspersion with the utmost abhorrence, as the Devil's lie! (An Evangelical Spirit)

Expositor's writes that...

The context may well vindicate the KJV paraphrase with its emphasis on acceptance—"wherein he hath made us accepted in the Beloved." It is the objective grace of God that is in view, indicating His favorable regard, rather than the further ethical effect of that grace in making us gracious. (Gaebelein, F, Editor: Expositor's Bible Commentary 6-Volume New Testament. Zondervan Publishing)

Adrian Rogers asks "why am I accepted? Not because I'm in such great shape, not because of anything that I have done, but God has accepted me for Christ's sake. The same thing the Bible says in Ephesians 4:32 "be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you." And, just as Mephibosheth was accepted in Jonathan, I am accepted in Jesus. And, when I see this, when I see that God already loves me, that He loves me now, even though I am imperfect, even though I have faults and failures and foibles, I am still the righteousness of God in Christ. That righteousness has been imputed to me, and I need to recognize my righteousness, and I need to rely upon my resources in Christ. God has blessed me with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Eph 1:3). And, I need, dear friend, not only to do that, but I need to receive my relationship, which is this: I am accepted in the beloved. I need to cease trying to work my way to God. Listen, holiness is not the way to Christ. Christ is the way to holiness....we share with the Lord Jesus the riches of His person. You see, when I preached last Sunday, "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God" (1 John 3:1), we are brothers to the Lord Jesus Christ. And, even more than that, we're members of His Body. We are in Christ, and Christ is in us. And, through the Holy Spirit we have union with the Lord Jesus Christ. And, you are "accepted in the beloved." In Ephesians 1:6, the Bible says God has done this, "to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved" (Ephesians 1:6). Who is the Beloved? Jesus. And, God said, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased" (Matthew 3:17; Matthew 17:5). Where am I? I am in Christ. And, if I'm in Christ, I am rich in my person. When God looks at Jesus, He sees me. When God looks at me, He sees Jesus. Now, you may not believe that, but, friend, it is true. ...You do not work to make yourself acceptable to Him. Remember that? You can't work your way into acceptance. You are accepted in Jesus, in the beloved (Ephesians 1:6)....Learn and Believe that God Has Accepted You by Grace Number one: Learn it and believe it—that God has accepted you by grace. God has accepted you by grace. And, He does this—Ephesians 1, verse 6—the Bible says, "to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved" (Ephesians 1:6). How does God make you accepted? By His grace—not by your attainment, not by your works, not by your striving. And, when you understand this, "to the praise of the glory of his grace." Anytime anybody really understands grace, they always want to write a song about it—about grace. ...I am now somebody in Christ. And that, ladies and gentleman, deals with my basic insecurities....He doesn't make us feel unaccepted. He doesn't make us feel unworthy. That's the devil....First of all we need to understand that God has accepted you. Not because of anything good in you. He has accepted you because of His grace. We are made accepted in the beloved. We're not valuable. God doesn't love us because we're valuable, we're valuable because He loves us. He just accepts us. Praise God for that. Can you accept that He accepts you? That's wonderful. Not because of you but because of His. He hath made us accepted. God accepts us and that is grace. We accept that God accepts us, that is faith. Do you know what faith is? Faith is my acceptance of God's acceptance of me. In spite of all of my sin and my failure—bless God, hallelujah—He loves me and accepts me. That is faith....How are we accepted? In the beloved, in Jesus. "In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace." That's so wonderful....The Bible says in Ephesians 1:6, "... he hath made us accepted in the Beloved." So God accepts me. That is what? Say grace. Grace. All right. Grace....Now, here's the next thing. God accepts me—that is grace. Faith, the next step, is my acceptance of God's acceptance of me. That's what faith is. Faith just accepts the fact that God accepts me. Say faith. Faith. All right. Grace. Faith. Grace—God accepts me; Faith—I accept that God accepts me.

Spurgeon - If we be indeed ‘accepted in the beloved’, does it not show how close, how real our union with the Beloved must be? Do we even share in Christ’s acceptance with God? Then we are one with him in everything.... Is not that a wonderful union, closer than the marriage bond, which causes us to share in Christ’s righteousness, so that the holy God can say to us who are sinful by nature, ‘You are acceptable to me because of your connection with my Son’?....h, the Lord sees his people so wrapped up in Christ that he must accept them in him. If I accept a man, I cannot quarrel with his little finger; if I accept a man, I accept his whole body and so, since the Father accepts Christ, he accepts every member of his mystical body.

When from the dust of death I rise,
To take my mansion in the skies,
E’en then shall this be all my plea,
“Jesus hath lived and died for me."

David Jeremiah - The Bible says that God knows those who are His (2 Timothy 2:19) and that He knows the way of the righteous (Psalm 1:6). Those verses suggest the part of God’s omniscience I like the best—how it impacts my daily fellowship with Him. God is the best, perfect friend all of us have ever longed for. He never takes things the wrong way or misunderstands what we say or do. There’s nothing He can discover about us which would make Him love us any less....We spend so much time longing for transparency and intimacy … longing for someone with whom we can share our thoughts and dreams … someone who will understand us even when we are confused about what we say or feel. We want someone who will accept our good thoughts and our bad, someone in whose presence we would have no fear at all. We say, “I would spend every moment I could with such a person if I could only find him. I would live in the safety of that person’s understanding and acceptance. I would tell that person everything I’m afraid to tell everyone else.” You can see where I am going with this, can’t you? We have such a person in God. In fact, He already knows all the things within us that we are aching to talk to someone about—He already knows them! Our challenge is to recognize that God is the partner we’ve been longing for and begin to dwell in His presence, accepting His acceptance of us. God knows me and He knows you. He knows everything we’ve ever done right and everything we’ve ever done wrong; every righteous thought and every unrighteous thought. And here’s what else He knows: He knows that I am “accepted in the Beloved” (Ephesians 1:6); that I have been declared righteous through the blood of Jesus Christ. He knows that I stand holy in the presence of God through His Son, Jesus Christ. And though He sees all of my error and failure and sin, He sees it through the lens of His grace that declares me positionally and eternally holy in His sight. I have been chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world was laid, and I stand holy before God. And if you know Jesus Christ, you stand holy before God. God is the only person who can see us as we are in the flesh and as we are in Christ at the same time, and the only person who will choose to walk with us unconditionally day after day.

F B Meyer - That is your standing. Your nature may be frail and fickle, your sins may sometimes overwhelm, but you shall know that I am in the Father, and ye in me (Jn 14:20), accepted in the Beloved.

So near, so very near to God,
I cannot nearer be,
For in the person of His Son
I am as near as He,

Alan Carr defines rest as "quietness, calmness, peace, refreshment.” All those who come to Jesus are given rest. (Ro 5:1-2). (And so we can) Rest from our attempts to please God - Eph. 1:6.... He loves us in spite of our failures! We never have to earn His love. According to the Scriptures, we are "accepted in the Beloved”, Eph. 1:6.

I'm forgiven, because You were forsaken
I'm accepted, You were condemned
I'm alive and well, Your Spirit is within me
Because You died and rose again.

Amazing Love, how can it be,
That You, my King should die for me?
Amazing Love, I know it's true
It's my joy to honor You in all I do to honor You
(Amazing Love)

As the Spirit of God opens our eyes and minds to the reality of these truths, our hearts should sing out with the hymn writer, "love so amazing, so divine; demands my life, my heart, my all."

Donald Barnhouse -The substitutionary death of the Lord Jesus Christ has delivered us completely from the penalty of sin....This deliverance was not only negative in placing all our sins upon the Savior; it was also positive: it put the righteousness of God to our account, joined us to Christ in His resurrection, united us to Him so that God can look upon us even as He looks upon His Son. We have been accepted in the Beloved (Eph. 1:6), and “made the righteousness of God in Christ” (2 Cor. 5:21). It would be absolutely impossible for a holy God to hold anything against one whose sin has been placed on the Savior and to whose account the righteousness of God has been placed. We have been justified. That is the deliverance which is ours by the death of the Savior on the cross....In fact, having been justified by faith we are found to be in Christ, and therefore it is totally impossible that we should not be pleasing unto the Father, for we have been “made accepted in the beloved” (Eph. 1:6)....Note the purpose: to the praise of the glory of His grace....The unsaved men are never called the beloved of God. You who read, you are indeed the loved of God; but, if you wish to be among the beloved of God, you must be made accepted in the Lord Jesus Christ who is the Father’s Beloved Son. It is this of which Paul writes to the Ephesian Church, “To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the Beloved” (Eph. 1:6). Let every individual realize this most important truth. The heart of the Bible teaching is that no man could be acceptable to God in himself. We are sinners, and a holy God could never draw us to Himself without contamination. The sacrifice of Christ was in no small way a sanitary measure to keep Heaven from being defiled. God could not take us to Heaven just as we are. We would wreck the place, and it would not be Heaven any more, it would merely be some part of earth removed to Heaven. But when the Lord God made the way whereby He could put all of our sins upon the Saviour and all of the righteousness of the Saviour upon us, we could then be received by the Father without defilement. We were made accepted in the Beloved. We are in Christ, our sins gone forever, and Christ’s righteousness our garment. This is why we may stand boldly before God without any fear. His love has banished our fear and made us accepted in the Beloved and therefore beloved of God.

Ironside - God has made us “accepted in the Beloved” (Eph. 1:6). As believers we are all accepted in Christ, but here we find that he is urgently desirous of being accepted of Christ. Notice the difference. Accepted in Him—that is my standing. God sees me in Him, and Christ Jesus is made unto me wisdom, even righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. He is my perfection. I am complete in Him. But now I who already am complete in Him, who already have been accepted in Him, am to be exercised about being accepted of Him. Accepted of Him really means being well-pleasing to Him. You see, accepted in Him is my standing, accepted of Him has to do with my state. I wonder whether this is our ambition. Let us search our hearts and ask what our ambition really is. Is it to excel in some particular line for which you feel you are specially adapted? Is it to be thought well of by men and women like yourself? Or is it to be well-pleasing to the Lord, to have His approval?

Darby - Now, as to justification, this truth makes our position perfect. In us there is no good thing. We are accepted in the Beloved—perfectly accepted in His acceptance, our sins being entirely put away by His death.

Unger - As far as the justified believer is concerned, he faces no condemnation or judgment (Rom. 8:1). The guilt of his sin has been removed (Ro. 3:7), and he stands positionally “in Christ” and hence accepted “in the Beloved” (Eph. 1:6).

IN CHRIST
ALONE

William MacDonald - In Christ speaks of their spiritual position. When they were saved, God placed them in Christ, “accepted in the beloved.” (Ep 1:6) Henceforth, they had His life and nature (2Pe 1:4). Henceforth, they would no longer be seen God as children of Adam (1Co 15:22) or as unregenerate men, but He would now see them in all the acceptability of His own Son. The expression in Christ conveys more of intimacy, acceptance, and security than any human mind can understand

Ray Stedman - The only spiritual blessing that can ever come to you from God must always come in Christ. There is no other way that it can come.

Spurgeon - One of the first doctrines of our holy faith is that of the union of all believing souls with Christ. We are blessed with all spiritual blessings in Christ. Apart from Christ we are nothing (cp Jn 15:5); in Christ we have "all spiritual blessings" We are rich as Christ is rich, when we are united to him by the living bond of faith.

Simon J. Kistemaker - To be in Christ connotes being part of Christ's body (I Cor. 12:27), and Christ brings about a radical transformation in the believer's life. Instead of serving the ego, the Christian follows Christ and responds to the law of love for God and the neighbor.

John Piper - We are united to Christ at once, through our first faith, not progressively. No one is half in and half out. And if we are in Christ, all that He is He is for us - from the very first instant of faith. This is wonderful news for sinners who face a long haul in becoming in life what we are in Christ.

David Garland - in Christ can mean several things that are not mutually exclusive: that one belongs to Christ, that one lives in the sphere of Christ's power, that one is united with Christ, or that one is part of the body of Christ, the believing community. Paul's assumption is that being in Christ should bring about a radical change in a person's life (2Cor 5:17).

F B Meyer - The Rest for Us. Thus we come to the Rest of which the Sabbath spoke. We enter into the Rest of God, and the Rest of God enters and pervades our soul. We know that we have passed from death into life; that we are justified from all things; that we are accepted in the Beloved; that we are sons of God and joint heirs with Christ; that all things work together for good; that the grace of God will always be sufficient for our need; and that grace will one day flower into glory; and out of these convictions comes the Peace of God that passeth understanding and the inward calm out of which the noblest service emanates.

NO FEAR OF JUDGMENT

1Jn 4:17 (NLT) And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we are like Christ here in this world.

1Jn 4:17 (KJV) - Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is (not was, but is), so are we in this world.

because as He is so also are we in this world—“He” is literally, “that One.” Note that John says that as Christ is—not was, but is—so are we in this world. Believers are in Christ—accepted in the Beloved, Ephesians says. Just as Christ is the embodiment of the invisible God who is love, believers are in a sense representatives of the God who is love—to a lost and dying world.

H A Ironside comments on John's statement “That we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is (not was, but is), so are we in this world,” that is, as He (Christ) is in relation to judgment. He has already passed through the judgment and will never have to go into it again. He will never again know the forsaking of God, the enshrouding of His soul with the blackness of darkness, the taste of the bitter cup, the agony, shame, and curse of the cross. All that is in the past. He went through it all for us and now so truly are we linked up with Him that, “As He is, so are we in this world.”

Octavius Winslow...Behold your present standing, believer in Christ! Turn your eye away from all your failures in obedience-the flaws and imperfections that mark your sincere endeavors to serve Christ and to glorify God- and see where your true acceptance is, even in the Beloved of the Father, "The Lord our righteousness." "Accepted in the Beloved," is the record that will raise you above all the fears and despondencies arising from your shortcomings and failures, and fill you with peace, and joy, and assurance. (Christ, the Wonderful)

We have boldness,’ says John, because ‘as He is, so are we.’ (1Jn 4:17) Now that is a very strong statement of a truth that popular, evangelical theology has far too much obscured. People talk about being, at the last, ‘accepted in the beloved.’ God be thanked, it is true. A sweet old hymn that a great many of us learned when we were children, though it is not so well known in these days, says:-

Bold shall I stand in that great day,
For who aught to my charge shall lay,
While through Thy blood absolved I am
From sin’s tremendous curse and shame?

Nisbet - Our souls are sinful, sin-stained at their best, serving God with a divided allegiance, unworthy to offer themselves to Him, still more unworthy to be “commended” to Him. But He makes us one with Himself. Because we are made one with Him, therefore we, too, are “accepted in the Beloved.” When God accepted the human soul of Christ, He accepted also the brethren of Christ. This commendation of His soul to God includes us too. We, listening to these words, take courage that when our last hour shall come we may do the same, though our obedience has fallen so far short, so utterly short, of His. So, as these closing words went through the spaces up to the throne of God I fancy that I hear the great response “From henceforth blessed are the dead that die in the Lord. Yea, saith the Spirit, for they rest from their labours.” They who die in the Lord are accepted in Him. His words are their words; in His steps their feet tread; He receives their spirits; He presents them to the Father. The words of the first martyr tell us this.’

A PROMPT TO
PRACTICE OUR POSITION

In the Beloved accepted am I,
Risen, ascended, and seated on high;
Saved from all sin thro' His infinite grace,
With the redeemed ones accorded a place!
—Martin

Piper -Now that you are accepted in the beloved—justified by faith alone—the Holy Spirit goes to work on you, and you start to become in practice what you are in Christ. And thus the pilgrim principle is unleashed:

Lewis Sperry Chafer - THE PECULIAR WALK AND DAILY LIFE OF THE CHRISTIAN. Conforming to the general divisions of this subject as intimated above, it may be observed: The motive which actuates the conduct and service of the one who is perfectly saved in Christ is of necessity radically different from any and every legal incentive. To the saved one, being perfected forever in Christ, made accepted in the Beloved, and now a recipient of every spiritual blessing, no meritorious appeal is appropriate; and the only motive for correct conduct remaining for such a one is that of walking worthy of the calling wherewith he is called. Living with a view to securing the favor of God, and living in the favor of God already secured in Christ, are two widely different motives. One is legal, the other is gracious, and the gracious manner of life is governed by divine beseechings which are adapted to those who are under grace (Rom. 12:1, 2; Eph. 4:1–3).

Maclaren - So, because we have been accepted in the Beloved, and have received the atonement for our sins through His great sacrifice, we are to be consecrated to His service and, touched by the fire which He sends down, we are to be changed into a sweet odour acceptable to Him as were 'the saints which are in Ephesus.'

Dwight Edwards commenting on Phil 1:2 gives us the balance we must remember when we speak of "accepted in the Beloved"...We are thoroughly secure in the father --> son relationship we have with God, for we are eternally ACCEPTED in the Beloved. Eph. 1:6. Nothing, but nothing can separate us from the love of God. It must also be remembered however, that Christ is our Lord. We have been bought with a price and our bodies are no longer our own. We now are the property of Jesus Christ and are subject to His desires for our life. Therefore we are ACCOUNTABLE as well as ACCEPTED.

Horatius Bonar writes...He who has been accepted in the beloved, has not daily to go and plead for acceptance, nor to do or say anything which implies that the condemnation, from which he has been delivered, has returned; but he has to mourn over, to confess, to seek forgiveness for daily sins. The two states are quite distinct, yet quite consistent with each other. The complete acceptance of the believing man does not prevent his sinning, nor do away with the constant need of new pardons for his sins; and the recurrence of sin does not cancel his acceptance, nor is the obtaining of new pardons at variance with his standing as a forgiven man. (Christ the Cleanser)

Richison - Beloved, God loves every believer with exactly the same amount of love. God loves that miserable believer just as much as he loves you. Eph 1:6 “…accepted in the beloved one.”

Oswald Chambers on Righteousness - Imputed righteousness must never be made to mean that God puts the robe of His righteousness over our moral wrong, like a snow-drift over a rubbish heap; that He pretends we are all right when we are not. The revelation is that “Christ Jesus … is made unto us … righteousness”; it is the distinct impartation of the very life of Jesus on the ground of the Atonement, enabling me to walk in the light as God is in the light, and as long as I remain in the light God sees only the perfections of His Son. We are “accepted in the Beloved.”

Charles Simeon - The man that has no fears or jealousies about his interest in the love of God, has no just conception of it at all. He may descant learnedly on the Scriptures, but he knows nothing of the mystery contained in them. To be in suspense and doubt whether we are accepted in the Beloved, is to a true Christian more painful than the severest bodily suffering could be. On the other hand, to be able to say, “Christ hath loved me and given himself for me;” “My Beloved is mine, and I am his;” this is a very heaven upon earth: and when the Christian can adopt this language, and feel “the love of God shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Ghost,” “his soul is indeed satisfied as with marrow and fatness:” he cares for nothing, and desires nothing: created objects lose all their luster, when once he has thus beheld the Sun of Righteousness shining in his glory.]

Hawker - Oh! the blessedness of being accepted in the Beloved! Eph. 1:6.

Ironside - I have been judged in my Substitute. All my sins are settled for. I do not mean that I will not be judged for my works. That is a different occasion. We stand now before God in relation to the judgment in the same place as His blessed Son stands. He has made us “accepted in the Beloved.” We are accepted in Him. Don’t let any one cheat you out of the joy of that. The Father loves me as much as He loves the Lord Jesus Christ. Isn’t it wonderful to be a Christian? “That the world may know that Thou hast sent Me, and hast loved them, as Thou hast loved Me.”

John Bunyan tells us in Grace Abounding how this message from God was spoken to his soul, “Thy righteousness is in heaven.” “And me thought I saw, with the eyes of my soul, Jesus Christ at God’s right hand; there, I say, was my righteousness; so that wherever I was, or whatever I was doing, God could not say of me, he wants my righteousness, for that was just before Him. I saw also, moreover, that it was not my good frame of heart that made my righteousness better, nor yet my bad frame of that made my righteousness worse; for my righteousness was Jesus Christ Himself, ‘the same yesterday, and to-day and for ever.’ Now did the chains fall off my legs indeed.”

While his faith rests on what Christ has done, his hope waits for what he will do.

He knew they were accepted in the Beloved; Christ being eminently so: He being the Son of God’s love. The Father therefore having accepted their persons in Him, carried the strongest evidence with it, that these persons were the beloved of God. If so, they might well be beloved by the apostle. The elect of God are the beloved of God. And they are the elect of God because they are the beloved of God.

June Hunt - I Am Accepted by God - “He hath made us accepted in the beloved [Jesus]” (EPHESIANS 1:6 KJV). Many people have a recording in their minds playing the same song over and over again. The title? If Only. The air play? Top 10! Not just for weeks, but for years. The most distinguishing feature of this song is its brevity—only one line long. “If only _________, then I might have pleased my dad.” “If only…I had been smarter in school.” “If only…I had been better in sports.” “If only…I had been more like my brother.” “If only…I had been born first.” “If only…I had not been born at all!” All through our lives, this one-line song continues to play. We even remember the ones from our earliest childhood experiences and keep rehearsing them…an indicator that we are emotionally stuck. The child who hears, “You’ll never amount to anything” will struggle with self-worth. The child who hears, “I wish you had never been born” becomes performance-based throughout life, trying to prove some sense of importance to everyone. Perhaps the perceived “If it weren’t for you, I’d be happy” theme is the most melancholy melody of all. This kind of rejection ravages the heart of a child…of any age. Dr. Charles Stanley says most of us value the acceptance of our parents more than any other person. He cites businessmen in their forties, fifties, and even sixties who are still seeking their father’s acceptance and approval…even though their fathers are dead. The little boy inside still cries out, I’ve got to get my dad to accept me. While we all make mistakes, in God’s eyes you are no mistake. As a child of God, you are never unacceptable to Him. He says, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5). Jesus understands your innermost feelings when you’ve been rejected. He personally experienced the same kind of rejection from His family. “He came unto his own, and his own received him not” (John 1:11 KJV). Therefore, who can better empathize with your need for acceptance than your Lord!

Be absolutely assured God never looks at you and says, “If only…” He loves and accepts you, period…just as you are. When you see yourself through God’s eyes, you will exchange those old, warped, worn-out melodies of self-condemnation for the simple but classic refrain: Jesus loves me! This I know, for the Bible tells me so…Jesus loves me! He will stay close beside me all the way.

Personalize these verses in your own words: Psalm 27:10 Jeremiah 31:3 Father, through Your eyes I can see that I… I am secure because…I am accepted in the beloved. (Seeing Yourself Through God's Eyes).

Why did God predestine us to adoption? The result of God's gracious dealings with men is ultimately the praise of the glory of His grace.

In the Beloved - To Whom does Paul refer? To Christ of course. He is our sole (soul) Source of acceptance with God. Take a moment to prayerfully ponder this incredible truth that we as the children of God (see 1Jn 3:1-note, 1Jn 3:2-note) are now and forever in Him (See in Christ ), in identification with Him, in covenant oneness with Him (See The Oneness of Covenant) and Oneness Notes), in an eternal bond with Him, in an indissoluble union with Him! In Christ forever we are accepted by the Father for He is forever pleased with His Beloved Son in Whom we live and breathe and have our being eternally! Amazing grace indeed that in the Beloved, the Father of glory now calls us "Beloved" (1Th 1:4-note, Ro 1:7-note, Jude 1:1), now and forever His "beloved children" (Eph 5:1-note) Hallelujah!

Ruth Paxson comments on the incredibly important preposition "in"...

"In" -- Can we ever grasp fully the meaning of this little word to us? In Him Whom the Father loves supremely we are. In the Beloved whose righteousness and holiness satisfy every demand of the Father's justice and holiness we stand. The Beloved Son is our divine rainbow, God's pledge to us who are made accepted in Him that we will never again be cast out from His presence. In the Son of His love the Father receives us as He receives Him and loves us as He loves Him. It would be impossible to believe such an apparently incredible statement did not Christ Himself declare it. Then we must believe it and rejoice in it.

Comment: Beloved, in our old nature, we all strive for "acceptance" with our fellow man, and many of us have been soundly rejected by those closest to us, and we have great difficulty "accepting" the truth that we truly are "accepted in the Beloved." So take a moment to mediate on the prayer Jesus prayed for us which contains His requests which are so transcendent and incomprehensible that it will surely take eternity to fathom their depths but which can just as surely in this present life bring solace and comfort to our souls and satisfy our hunger for acceptance...

I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me (!!!). "Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am, so that they may see My glory which You have given Me, for You loved Me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, although the world has not known You, yet I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me and I have made Your name known to them, and will make it known, so that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them." (John 17:23-26)

I'm forgiven, because You were forsaken
I'm accepted, You were condemned
I'm alive and well, Your Spirit is within me
Because You died and rose again.

Amazing Love, how can it be,
That You, my King should die for me?
Amazing Love, I know it's true
It's my joy to honor You in all I do to honor You
(Amazing Love)

Spurgeon observes that...

God’s love of His dear Son covers all believers, as a canopy covers all who come beneath it. As a hen covers her chickens with her wings, so God’s love to Christ covers all the children of promise. As the sun shining forth from the gates of the morning gilds all the earth with golden splendor, so this great love of God to the Well-beloved, streaming forth to Him, enlightens all who are in Him. God is so boundlessly pleased with Jesus that in Him He is altogether well pleased with us....

Much went before this, but, oh, what a morning without clouds rose upon us when we knew our acceptance and were assured thereof. Acceptance was the watchword, and had troops of angels met us we should have rejoiced that we were as blest as they. Understand that this acceptance comes to us entirely as a work of God--“He hath made us accepted in the Beloved.” We never made ourselves acceptable, nor could we have done so, but He that has made us first in creation, has now made us new by His grace, and so has made us accepted in the Beloved. That this was an act of pure grace there can be no doubt, for the verse runs thus, “Wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved,” that is, in His grace. There was no reason in ourselves why we should have been put into Christ, and so accepted; the reason lay in the heart of the Eternal Father Himself.

Can we get a step farther? Will the Holy Spirit help us while I say a few words by way of enlargement?

1. If we are “accepted in the Beloved,” then, first, our persons are accepted: we ourselves are well pleasing to Him. God looks upon us now with pleasure.

2. Being ourselves accepted, the right of access to Him is given us. When a person is accepted with God he may come to God when he chooses. He is one of these courtiers who may come even to the royal throne and meet with no rebuff. No chamber of our great Father’s house is closed against us; no blessing of the covenant is withheld from us; no sweet smile of the Father’s face is refused us.

3. And, being accepted ourselves, our prayers are also accepted. Children of God, can you sincerely believe this? When God delights in men He gives them the desires of their hearts.

4. It follows, as a pleasant sequence, that our gifts are accepted, for those who are accepted with God find a great delight in giving of their substance to the glory of His name. Then let us try what we can do for Him. Here is a great lump of quartz, but if the Lord can see a grain of gold, He will save the quartz for the sake of it. He says, “Destroy it not, for a blessing is in it.” I do not mean that the Lord deals thus with all men. It is only for accepted men that He has this kind way of accepting their gifts. Had you seen me, when a young man, and an usher, walking through the streets with rolls of drawings from a boys’ school, you would have guessed that I considered them of no value and fit only to be consigned to the fire; but I always took a great interest in the drawings of my own boy, and I still think them rather remarkable. You smile, I dare say, but I do so think, and my judgment is as good as yours. I value them because they are his, and I think I see budding genius in every touch, but you do not see it because you are so blind. I see it since love has opened my eyes. God can see in His people’s gifts to Him and their works for Him a beauty which no eyes but His can perceive. Oh, if He so treats our poor service, what ought we not to do for Him? What zeal, what alacrity should stimulate us! If we are ourselves accepted our sacrifices shall be acceptable....

“Accepted in the Beloved.” May not each believer talk thus with himself--I have my sorrows and griefs, I have my aches and pains, and weaknesses, but I must not repine, for God accepts me. Ah me! How one can laugh at griefs when this sweet word comes in, “accepted in the Beloved.” I may be blind, but I am “accepted in the Beloved:” I may be lame, I may be poor, I may be despised, I may be persecuted, I may have much to put up with in many ways, but really these troubles of the flesh count for little or nothing to me since I am “accepted in the Beloved.” Is not this a word to die with? We will meet death and face his open jaws with this word, “Accepted in the Beloved.” Will not this be a word to rise with amidst the blaze of the great judgment day?

And now I wish to finish with this one practical use. If it be so that we are “accepted in the Beloved,” then let us go forth and tell poor sinners how they can be accepted too.

Spurgeon asks...

Why is that peculiar title ("the Beloved") here used? It might have been said, we are accepted in Christ, or accepted in the Mediator; there must be some motive for giving Him this special name in this place. The motive is declared to be that we may praise the glory of divine grace. God did not want for a beloved when he made us His beloved: His heart was not pining for an object; His affections were not lone and desolate. His only-begotten Son was His delight, and there was room enough in Him for all the Father’s love; it was we that needed to be loved, and so the Beloved is mentioned that we may remember the unselfishness of divine grace. He makes us His beloved, but he had a Beloved before.

We are also reminded that we are “accepted in the Beloved” to let us know that God has not shifted His love-His first Beloved is His Beloved still. We have not supplanted His dear Son, nor even diverted a beam of love from Him. The Lord has called us beloved who were not so, and made us a people who were not a people; but He has not withdrawn a grain of love from Jesus, Whom He still calls “mine Elect. in Whom my soul delights.” All the infinite love of God still flows to Jesus, and then to us in Him. It pleased the Father that to Him a fullness of love should be given, that out of it we might each one receive. God's love to us is His love to His Son flowing in a hundred channels. For His sake He makes the wedding-feast, and we are the happy guests who sit at the table. Not for our sakes is this done, but for Jesus’ sake, that so it might be all of grace. His perpetual acceptance with God is our acceptance, that nothing legal, nothing whereof we might boast, might be mingled with the work of sovereigns grace. (Ephesians 1:6 Accepted on the Great Father)

Steven Cole also asks...

Why does Paul use that designation of Jesus Christ (Beloved) here? There could be several reasons. The eternal love that exists between the Father and the Son is a perfect love. When the Father adopts us into His family, we are drawn into this circle of infinite, perfect love (John 15:9). In Jesus’ great prayer for His disciples just before the cross, He prays (John 17:23), “I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.” What a staggering thought, that the Father loves us even as He loves His own Son! So Paul calls Jesus “the Beloved” to show that we are now in this relationship of love with the Father and the Son. Also, Paul may call Jesus “the Beloved” to show the great price that God paid to adopt us as His children. Jesus was supremely God’s beloved Son, in whom He was well pleased (Matt. 3:17; Col. 1:13; Luke 20:13). Yet the Father and the Son were willing to interrupt this perfect relationship of love so that the Son could go to the cross and endure the wrath of the Father on our behalf! As Paul writes (Rom. 8:32), “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?”

Rainsford...

He (God the Father) hath made us His Hephzibahs (Hebrew = "my delight is in her" - This is God's heart for Zion, who will once again be called "My delight is in her!" = Isa 62:4)--made us dear to Him in the Beloved--made us His delights, a joy to Himself in the Beloved....And yet there are multitudes of professing Christians who do not trust, or know, or believe that they are accepted in Him, and who do not enjoy the blessedness and rest of looking up into their Father’s face and recognizing the love bestowed on them in the Father’s Beloved, and the security that that love has surrounded them with!

They think they are only accepted according to the measure of their prayers, their merits, their good works, and their faith, instead of according to the measure of the Father’s everlasting love for His Son.

Yes! we are here plainly taught that our acceptance in the first place was not even on account of Christ’s own merits, or prayers, or blood, or sacrifice, much less ours, but solely and only on account of our relation to His person as God’s Beloved One; and the subsequent interference of sin only brought out the resources of redemption, forgiveness, salvation, and adoption in Him “in Whom all fulness dwells.” (Col 1:19-note, cp Col 2:9-note)

Lehman Strauss...Verse six teaches us that every true believer has been foreordained to be such a trophy of the grace of God as to cause men to praise the glory of His grace. Wuest: resulting in praise of the glory of His grace which He freely bestowed upon us in the Beloved

Spurgeon writes...

What astounding grace does the Lord display—in accepting our poor, imperfect offerings! What rich merit abides in our Lord Jesus! What sweet fragrance beyond expression dwells in Him—to drown and destroy our foul sulphurous offerings, and to make us accepted in the Beloved! Glory be unto our glorious High Priest, Whose perfect life and sin-atoning death, is so sweet—that the Holy Judge is well pleased with us for His righteousness' sake—and accepts us in Him, even with our sulphurous incense!

NET Note...

God’s grace can be poured out on believers only because of what Christ has done for them. Hence, he bestows his grace on us because we are in his dearly loved Son.

Beloved (25) (agapao [word study]) speaks especially of love as based on evaluation and choice, a matter of will and action. The Beloved = Christ, the one the Father loves. Christ is the essence of the love that God with which He loves the lost and which is the product of the Spirit in the heart of the yielded believer. God the Father has always loved God the Son with this love which is permanent. Note that Beloved is perfect tense which in this context conveys the idea of permanence and speaks of the Father having always loved Son. Christ is the One Who is ever in the state of being loved by the Father! And where are saved sinners? In the Beloved

It is interesting to note that the term "Beloved" is a title applied in the Septuagint (LXX) to Israel in its special role as God's chosen race.

The grace is bestowed in and with Christ Himself. It is in the gift of God's Son that the gift of grace becomes ours and the splendor of that grace is fully realized and seen by mankind.

God the Father declared for all to hear...

(and behold, a voice out of the heavens, saying)
"This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well-pleased." (Mt 3:17)

And because we have place our faith in the Beloved Son, God the Father...

delivered (rescued - see rhuomai) us from the domain (exousia - "right and the might") of darkness (nothing less than the kingdom of Satan, in which we were all once captive slaves - see Ep 2:1, 2-note, Ep 2:3-note), and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son (Literally - the kingdom of the Son of His love), (Col 1:13-note)

And as a result Paul can write to the saints at Rome addressing them as..

all who are beloved of God in Rome, called as saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Ro 1:7-note)

The practical, albeit in human terms not fully comprehensible, conclusion is that because we are in covenant (see Covenant = exchange of Robes) with Christ (one with Him, identified with Him by faith), all that our Redeemer possesses is possessed by us and the Father now loves us even as He loves His own dear Son and He wills for us to enjoy every spiritual blessing that Christ enjoys in the heavenly places! What manner of love is this. How great is the love with which the Father has loved us and, yea, even love which was bestowed before the foundation of the world! (Ep 1:3, 4-note)

Wuest explains that...

The words “in the Beloved” are locative of sphere. That is, God the Father freely bestowed on us the grace which saved us, and did so in the sphere of the Lord Jesus, His Person and His work on the Cross. His grace could not operate in our salvation apart from the atoning death of our Lord, for God is not only a loving God, but a righteous and just God who cannot pass by sin, but must require that it be paid for. Only thus can He manifest His grace. (Wuest, K. S. Wuest's Word Studies from the Greek New Testament: Eerdmans)

Related Resource:

See study on meaning and significance of locative of sphere

Spurgeon notes that accepted in the Beloved connotes...

I. Positive union.

1. In the heart of Christ, and in His heart from all eternity. With prescient eye Christ beheld His people before they were yet formed. Hath He not said, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with the bands of My kindness have I drawn thee.” “As the Father hath loved me, even so have I loved you.”

2. We are also in Christ’s book. Having loved us we were chosen in Him and elected by His Father. We were not chosen separately and distinctly, and as individuals alone and apart. We were chosen in Christ. Blessed fact! the same register which includes Christ as first born, includes all the brethren.

3. We are in Christ’s hand. All those whom the Father gave to Christ were bestowed upon Christ as a surety; and in the last great day, at the Redeemer’s hand will God require the souls of all that were given to Him. Just as the Apostle Paul argues concerning Levi, that Levi is inferior to Christ; for he says, Abraham was less than Melchisedec, for without doubt the less is blessed of the greater, so also Levi was less than Melchisedec, for he was in the loins of Abraham when Melchisedec met him. So, beloved, as Levi was in the loins of Abraham and paid tithes to Melchisedec, so we were in the loins of Christ and paid the debt due to Divine justice, gave to the law its fulfilment, and to wrath its satisfaction. In the loins of Christ we have passed through the tomb already, and have entered into that which is within the veil, and are made to sit down in heavenly places, even in Him. This day the chosen of God are one with Christ and in the loins of Christ.

5. As we are in the heart of Christ, in the book of Christ, in the hand of Christ, and in the loins of Christ, there is yet another thought dearer and sweeter still. We are in the person of Christ; for we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. By the mysterious operations of the quickening Spirit the sinner begins to live a spiritual life. Now, in the moment when the spiritual life was first given, there commenced in that soul a vital and personal union with the person of Christ Jesus. There had always been in that soul a secret mystical union in the Divine purpose; but now there comes to be a union in effect, and the soul is in Christ from that hour, in a sense in which it never was before.

II. Accepted in the Beloved. What does our acceptance include?

1. Justification before God. We stand on our own trial. When we stand in Christ we are acquitted; while standing in ourselves the only verdict must be condemnation.

2. Divine complacency.

3. Divine delight.

III. Divine operations; “made accepted.” All of God, not of man.

At the Cross...

we become 'accepted in the Beloved.' Here the exchange takes place between the perfect and the imperfect. Believing in the perfect One, we become 'complete in Him.' Conscious only of evil, we take refuge in Him in whom there is no evil, that we may be represented by him before God, and so treated by God as being without evil, even in the eye of His holy law. Feeling our utter lack of goodness, we flee out of ourselves to One in whom there is all goodness—who is absolutely perfect; so perfect, so infinitely perfect, that He has enough and to spare of His perfection for us. The fullness of evil that is in us is thus not only covered over by the atonement of the atoning Son of God, so as to become invisible, as if it were non-existent—but is supplanted by the fullness of all goodness, is exchanged for the perfection of another, even of the perfect One, so that God, looking at us, sees only our Representative, and deals with us according to His excellency and preciousness. What we should have received, in the shape of punishment, He gets for us; what He claims and deserves in the shape of reward, and glory, and favor, we get, as represented by Him, and treated by God as entitled to all that to which He is entitled.

Our consent to be treated on the footing of this foreign merit, this perfection of another—is what God asks of us. Such is the proposal which the gospel makes to us. This is substantially the meaning of our believing in the Lord Jesus Christ. Receiving the divine testimony to the sin-bearer as true, we give our consent to be represented by Him before God. Thus we exchange places and persons with Him. He was made sin, we are made righteousness; He takes the curse, we take the blessing. We hear the cry upon the cross, "It is finished"—and we know that the work which justifies is done. All that follows—resurrection and ascension—is the result of the completed work; not the completing of it, but the fruits of its completion. 'He was delivered, because we had sinned; He was raised, because we were justified' (Romans 4:25). As it was 'by the blood of the everlasting covenant' that He was brought from the dead (Hebrews 13:20), so was it because our justification was finished on the cross that He rose from the dead. The knowledge of this brings to him who knows it forgiveness, acceptance, justification—we become 'accepted in the Beloved.' (The Cross Of The Lord Jesus)

Octavius Winslow...

A present salvation is an essential element of this Gospel Banquet thus provided for us in the wilderness. For the lack of a more simple recognition of this aspect of the gospel, many of God's people are deprived of much blessing. If saved at all-we are saved now. The believer is as entirely pardoned- as completely justified- as fully adopted at the present moment, as he will be when glorified. "By grace you are saved." "Accepted in the Beloved." "You are complete in Him." Could any truth be expressed in terms more strong, or placed in light more lucid? Oh marvelous banquet, that meets and satisfies all the requirements of the soul! Come to it with what infirmity- with what need- with what sorrow- with what frame you may, there is a place and a viand for you; a loving welcome, and a most free meal. "You prepare a table for me in the presence of my enemies." (The Banquet)

How few, in the language of the prophet, "possess these possessions." But the word of God fully justifies this view of a present salvation. Listen to its language. "I write unto you, little children, because ,our sins are forgiven for His name's sake " Observe, it is a present forgiveness! " To the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He has made us accepted in the Beloved." Observe, it is a present acceptance! "Beloved, now are we the sons of God" Mark, it is a present adoption! "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus " Notice, it is a present acquittal! Such is the authority upon which we earnestly urge you to realize your present standing in Christ. (THE GOD OF PATIENCE)

Ruth Paxson writes...

"Accepted" -- what a gracious word! What a wealth of significance in it! Those that were by nature "children of disobedience and wrath"." (Eph 2:2,3); so "far-off" from God that they were called strangers" (Eph 2:19); so deep down in the abyss of death and depravity that they were "without hope" (Eph 2:12); yet here said to be "accepted." How could such a change ever be wrought in the sinner? If so utterly disobedient, he would not want acceptance; if so utterly depraved, he could not make himself acceptable, even if he desired to. The sinner of Eph 2:1-3 is rendered both hopeless and helpless by sin. Then by whom and on what ground was the change wrought by which he was taken into the very heart and home of God?

"Made accepted." God has left to the sinner not an inch of ground for boasting. Not an atom of anything either in his character or in his conduct can avail to bring him into God's favour. If he is ever accepted by God, God Himself must act on his behalf.

John 17:23. "That the world may know that thou hast... loved them as thou hast loved me. "

Near, so very near to God
Nearer I could not be;
For in the person of His Son,
I'm just as near as He.

Dear, so very dear to God,
Dearer I could not be:
For in the person of His Son,
I'm just as dear as He.

"To the praise of the glory of his grace." Surely every saint should have a singing heart, and the theme of his song should ever be the matchless grace of God. The saints on earth and the redeemed in heaven unite in one grand, glorious symphony of "praise to the glory of his grace" wherein He took sinners like us and "made us accepted in the beloved."

Let us take one backward glance at our immeasurable wealth in the Father's grace before we look forward to that in the redemptive work of His Son:

Through His grace -- chosen -- loved

Through the exceeding riches of His grace -- accepted -- loved as the Son is loved.

Could our Father do more than this for us? Could He do less for His Son? Then should not our fearful, trembling hearts rest full-length upon the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus? [FONT color="#008000">And should not the dominating passion of our lives be to live to the praise of the glory of His grace?

John Trapp...recalls several human examples of "acceptance" based upon another person...

David saw the features of his friend Jonathan in lame Mephibosheth, and therefore loved him. He forgave Nabal at Abigail's intercession; and was pacified toward Absalom at Joab's. Pharaoh favoured Jacob's house for Joseph's sake. Shall not God do as much more for Jesus' sake? Joseph was well pleased with his brethren when they brought Benjamin; bring but the child Jesus in our arms (as Simeon did, and as Themistocles did the king of Persia's child) and he cannot but smile upon us. Were he never so much displeased before, yet upon the sight of this his well-beloved Son, in whom he is well pleased, all shall be calm and quiet, as the sea was when once Jonas was cast into it. (Trapp's Commentary on the New Testament)

J Sidlow Baxter associates the OT Levitical high priest's role (Aaron) in assuring acceptance of the sons of Israel before God (see Ex 28:38) and the NT truths about our Great High Priest...

As our Lord (Jesus Christ) represents us on high, "Holiness to the Lord" flashes from His brow. The brow is the noblest and most distinguishing feature of man. Holiness must be written here, to be seen before all else as the High Priest enters the most Holy Presence. This is the first thing God beholds in our glorious High Priest in the heavenly sanctuary. He bears it on HIS forehead that WE may be accepted! As Aaron was to bear the "holy crown" always (Ex 28:38), so Christ bears it always for us, so that in Him we become ALWAYS ACCEPTED! All this is taught doctrinally in the New Testament - especially in Ephesians and Hebrews. We are "accepted in the Beloved" (Ep 1:6) who bears us on His heart before God. We are chosen "in Him" to be "holy and without blame," (Eph 1:4) for He is our holiness. (Ed: Our "holiness" positionally is the Person of Christ. This truth should motivate and empower us [renew our minds] to daily work out of our high, holy position in practice!) We are told of the Divine "power to us-ward who believe" - and that power is seen, in Christ who bears His people on His mighty shoulder, "far above all principality and power and might, and every name that is named"! (Eph 1:21) Well may our praise forever flow to God for such a Saviour!

[FONT Through the riches of His grace -- predestinated -- loved as adult sonsPastor Ray Stedman applies the truth of Ephesians 1:6...[/FONT>

[FONT Through the riches of His grace -- predestinated -- loved as adult sonsWe must reestablish the great fact of our relationship to Christ.[/FONT> We must have ground for believing and reassuring ourselves that we are indeed "justified by faith," standing in God's presence not by our own righteousness, but by the righteousness of the Son of God, that we are accepted in the Beloved, that we are "in Christ," because, as Paul tells us in Romans 8, "There is therefore now no condemnation to those that are in Christ," Romans 8:1). In Christ all that He is appears on our behalf and therefore there is no condemnation to us. Now, therefore, if we are going to silence the doubts of our hearts, we must know that we are "of the truth." That is where we must begin. (Ed: As an aside, remember that truth counters the lies of Satan and that the battlefield is our "mind.") This is what we saw in Ephesians where the Apostle Paul urges us to put on the breastplate of righteousness Ephesians 6:14), by which the heart is guarded, the emotions, which are so easily subject to discouragement, gloom, and despair. Put on the breastplate of righteousness. Realize again that you are "of the truth," for it is by the mind's knowledge that the heart's doubts are silenced.

J C Philpot in "Meditations on Matters of Christian Faith & Experience" has a section on the miserable dregs of self...

"To the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He has made us accepted in the Beloved." Ephes. 1:6

We are ever looking for something in self to make ourselves acceptable to God, and are often sadly cast down and discouraged when we cannot find . . .

that holiness,

that obedience,

that calm submission to the will of God,

that serenity of soul,

that spirituality and heavenly-mindedness

which we believe to be acceptable in His sight.

Our . . .

crooked tempers,

fretful, peevish minds,

rebellious thoughts,

coldness,

barrenness,

alienation from good,

headlong proneness to ill,

with the daily feeling that we get no better but rather worse, make us think that God views us just as we view ourselves. And this brings on great darkness of mind and bondage of spirit, and we seem to lose sight of our acceptance in Christ, and get into the miserable dregs of self, almost ready to quarrel with God because we are so vile, and only get worse as we get older.

Now the more we get into these dregs of self, and the more we keep looking at the dreadful scenes of wreck and ruin which our heart presents to daily view, the farther do we get from the grace of the gospel, and the more do we lose sight of the only ground of our acceptance with God. It is "in the Beloved" that we are accepted, and

not for any . . .

good words,

good works,

good thoughts,

good hearts, or

good intentions of our own.

If our acceptance with God depended on anything in ourselves, we would have to adopt the Wesleyan creed, and believe we might be children of God today and children of the devil tomorrow.

What, then, is to keep us from sinking altogether into despair, without hope or help? Why, a knowledge of our acceptance "in the Beloved," independent of everything in us, good or bad.

"Their righteousness is of Me, says the Lord."

"You are complete in Him."

What a universal chorus of harmonious voices do we hear all sounding forth the same melodious strain--that we are accepted in the Beloved.

"He saved us, not because of the good things we did, but because of His mercy." Titus 3:5

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Dr Harry A Ironside has the following illustration on "Accepted in the Beloved" (Eph 1:6KJV) writing that...

Years ago I was preaching in the small town of Roosevelt, Washington, on the north bank of the Columbia River. I was the guest of friends who were sheep-raisers. It was lambing time and every morning we went out to see the lambs—hundreds of them—playing about on the green. One morning I was startled to see an old ewe go loping across the road, followed by the strangest looking lamb I had ever beheld. It apparently had six legs, and the skin seemed to be partially torn from its body in a way that made me feel the poor little creature must be suffering terribly. But when one of the herders caught the lamb and brought it over to me, the mystery was explained. That lamb did not really belong originally to that ewe. She had a lamb which was bitten by a rattlesnake and died. This lamb that I saw was an orphan and needed a mother’s care. But at first the bereft ewe refused to have anything to do with it. She sniffed at it when it was brought to her, then pushed it away, saying as plainly as a sheep could say it, “That is not our family odor!” So the herders skinned the lamb that had died and very carefully drew the fleece over the living lamb. This left the hind-leg coverings dragging loose. Thus covered, the lamb was brought again to the ewe. She smelled it once more and this time seemed thoroughly satisfied and adopted it as her own.

It seemed to me to be a beautiful picture of the grace of God to sinners. We are all outcasts and have no claim upon His love. But God’s own Son, the “Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the World,” has died for us and now we who believe are dressed up in the fleece of the Lamb who died. Thus, God has accepted us in Him

(Illustrations of Bible Truth. Moody Press, 1945)

So dear, so very dear to God,
More dear I cannot be;
The love wherewith He loves His Son,
Such is His love to me.

So near, so very near to God,
Nearer I could not be,
For in the person of His Son,
I am as near as He.
(cf John 17:23)

Comment: Beloved, do you see what John 17:23 is saying? Jesus is saying the love which the Father has for believers in Christ is of the same degree as the love which He has for His Son! Now if that does "blow us away" with God's amazing grace, I don't know what will!

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In Morning and Evening, Spurgeon writes the following devotional on Ephesians 1:6...

What a state of privilege! It includes our justification before God, but the term "acceptance" in the Greek means more than that. It signifies that we are the objects of divine complacence (Ed: Webster's 1828 = "the cause of pleasure or joy"!), nay, even of divine delight. How marvelous that we, worms, mortals, sinners, should be the objects of divine love! But it is only "in the beloved."

Some Christians seem to be accepted in their own experience, at least, that is their apprehension. When their spirit is lively, and their hopes bright, they think God accepts them, for they feel so high, so heavenly-minded, so drawn above the earth! But when their souls cleave to the dust, they are the victims of the fear that they are no longer accepted. If they could but see that all their high joys do not exalt them, and all their low despondencies do not really depress them in their Father's sight, but that they stand accepted in One Who never alters, in One Who is always the beloved of God, always perfect, always without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, how much happier they would be, and how much more they would honour the Saviour! Rejoice then, believer, in this: thou art accepted "in the beloved." Thou lookest within, and thou sayest, "There is nothing acceptable here!" But look at Christ, and see if there is not everything acceptable there. Thy sins trouble thee; but God has cast thy sins behind His back, and thou art accepted in the Righteous One. Thou hast to fight with corruption, and to wrestle with temptation, but thou art already accepted in him who has overcome the powers of evil. The devil tempts thee; be of good cheer, he cannot destroy thee, for thou art accepted in him who has broken Satan's head. Know by full assurance thy glorious standing. Even glorified souls are not more accepted than thou art. They are only accepted in heaven "in the beloved," and thou art even now accepted in Christ after the same manner.

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So Many Blessings - When disaster strikes, people are exceedingly generous in their outpouring of assistance. After the terrorist attacks in September 2001, New York City was flooded with an estimated $75 million worth of towels, blankets, flashlights, water bottles, canned beans, shovels, toothpaste, stuffed animals, radios, rubber boots, and thousands of other items. There was so much stuff that those affected could not use it all.

This reminds me of what happens when we turn in faith to Christ as our Savior. We were facing a personal disaster. Our sins put us in danger of an eternity of separation from God. The future was dark, hopeless.

Then Jesus stepped in and offered rescue. When we trusted Him, our heavenly Father lavished us with spiritual riches. Now we have more blessings than we can possibly use up. We are part of God's family (Ephesians 1:5). We have "redemption" and "the forgiveness of sins" (Ep 1:7). We are heirs of the One who owns everything (Ep 1:11). Our inheritance is sealed by the Holy Spirit (Ep 1:13,14).

The blessings of being a Christian just keep on coming. They'll never run out. What a generous, thoughtful God we serve! Let's praise Him for the countless blessings that overflow in our lives. —Dave Branon (Our Daily Bread, Copyright RBC Ministries, Grand Rapids, MI. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved)

Give me a spirit of thankfulness, Lord,
For numberless blessings given;
Blessings that daily come to me
Like dewdrops falling from heaven.
—Dawe

God's generous giving deserves thankful living.

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Accepted - As the gospel was being presented to a woman, she explained she had tried her best to please God. Then she added, "But I'm afraid God will never accept me."

The Christian talking with her said, "I agree with you. He never will."

A look of astonishment came over the woman's face, for she had not expected such a response.

The believer then explained, "No, He never will, but God has accepted His Son, and if you join yourself to Him through faith, you will find God's favor!"

Many people have been deceived into thinking they must somehow earn acceptance in the eyes of God. The Bible, however, tells us that there is nothing in us, nor in what we do, that can in any way merit God's love and favor (Ro 3:28; Eph. 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5). Our salvation is rooted in God's sovereign choice, His mercy, and Christ's sacrificial death for us (Eph. 1:4, 5, 6,7).

Trying to understand why God accepts us may baffle our minds, but the how is clear. Our acceptance comes in and through the Lord Jesus Christ, who paid the penalty for our sin, and who joins us to Himself. When we put our personal trust in Him and accept His forgiveness, we can be sure that we have been accepted. --Henry G. Bosch (Our Daily Bread, Copyright RBC Ministries, Grand Rapids, MI. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved)

Sons of God, beloved in Jesus!
O the wondrous word of grace;
In His Son the Father sees us,
And as sons He gives us place.
-Whittle

God accepts all who accept His Son.

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