Stick To The Savior (Ephesians 2:6-10)

Ephesians 2:6-10 – ⁶ He also raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavens in Christ Jesus, ⁷ so that in the coming ages he might display the immeasurable riches of his grace through his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. ⁸ For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift—⁹ not from works, so that no one can boast. ¹⁰ For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do. 

Delo Adhesive makes the strongest glues in the world. In 2019 they used one teaspoon of their Monopox glue to lift a truck weighing 38,000 pounds off the ground with a crane for an hour, setting a Guinness world record. Quite a feat for a little bit of glue. 

In the opening chapters of Ephesians, Paul talks about what a great feat salvation is. He’s been showing its amazing scope in the past, present, and future. As he wraps up this section of thought, he gives us insight into the nuts and bolts of how a person receives God’s salvation. It will culminate in that familiar verse: “You are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift.”

All the power and the blessings and the relief and the promises and the eternal inheritance we’ve been reading about since the book began are part of the fantastically generous work of a gracious God Whose. It’s all a gift held out to each human being on earth who can receive it by faith. 

What is faith? We often think of it as believing certain truths. But, faith is more than an intellectual recognition that God exists. There are plenty of things I “believe” but don’t care about. I believe the clocks are three hours ahead on the east coast, but it makes no difference to me. I believe that if I exercised more I would be healthier, but apparently I don’t believe it enough to do it.

The faith that lays hold of salvation is not like that. The Bible describes it as something we walk in and live by. We’re told that without faith it is impossible to please God. And then that passage goes on to describe a faithful person as one who not only believes that God exists, but draws near to Him and seeks Him, obeying what God says as it is revealed.

Klyne Snodgrass writes, “Faith has an adhesive quality to it; it binds the believer to the one who is believed. Salvation does not come from believing ideas or an emotional decision, but from being bound to Christ.”

This is why, on the one hand, you can see a person like Simon the Sorcerer in Acts 8 “believing” certain ideas, yet not being truly saved. His heart didn’t stick to Christ. On the other hand, we see a Apollos in Acts 18 with great passion and zeal for Jesus, yet needing to be instructed more accurately in truth. Apollos was bound to Christ, though he lacked significant knowledge. 

As Paul brings this section to a close, we should be encouraged to have a stickiness in our faith – sticking to the Savior and sticking to His plan for our lives as we grow in strength and knowledge.

Ephesians 2:6 –  ⁶ He also raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavens in Christ Jesus,

God wants us to totally adhere to Christ now and forever. Paul talks about us being in Christ and walking with Him. Elsewhere we’re told to let His mind be in us. This letter talks about how Christ and His Church are like a Head and a Body. God’s desire is total attachment between us and Him.

We have here more of that now-and-not-yet tension that we’ve seen before. Paul speaks in the past tense: We’re already raised up, already seated with Christ. It’s done. There’s no stopping this ultimate result. Of course, despite this being immutable fact, most of the time we feel far from this reality. We recognize that salvation is working out in the present as we progress toward the final fulfillment. It’s a process. That term raised is defined by Strong’s as being “revivified spiritually, in resemblance to” the Lord. We are being conformed into the image of Christ as God accomplishes salvation in us. Don’t get me wrong – if you’re a Christian, you’re saved. You don’t have to ripen to a certain level in order to get into heaven. But the process continues on and on from now till glory. 

Meanwhile, since God has raised us and seated us with Christ, that means we have authority now. We have blessings now. We have power now. We are no longer subject to death. We are dead to sin. We can overcome any temptation. We can walk as children of light.

Verse 6 also has important ramifications for our lives, many of which Paul is going to explain in the coming chapters. Because we are raised up and seated with Christ our relationships and our goals and our attitudes are going to be very different than what they were. Paul said to the Colossians, “Since you have been raised with Christ, seek the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.” There is a total perspective shift, a total change in the orientation of our lives.

Ephesians 2:7 – ⁷ so that in the coming ages he might display the immeasurable riches of his grace through his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 

God is going to put the Church on display in eternity. That is a mind-boggling revelation, but this verse has a lot of encouragement tucked inside of it. 

The first is that you are a display piece. Some of you are collectors. Your collection might be quite large, but you probably have a piece or two that is the crown jewel – the one you wouldn’t ever part with. For God, that is saved humanity. Think of all the creatures, all the cosmos, all the expansive accomplishments that an all-powerful God could amass for Himself. In eternity, He’s going to put you on display as His prize possession. 

We also can see an important aspect of God’s personality. He wants to display His kindness. Dane Ortlund writes, There is “one place in the Bible where the Son of God pulls back the veil and lets us peer way down into the core of who He is, and we are not told He is ‘austere and demanding in heart.’ We are not told that He is, ‘exalted and dignified in heart.’ Letting Jesus set the terms, His surprising claim is that He is ‘gentle and lowly in heart.’” And we see the Father’s desire to display kindness forever and ever through us and to us. He will keep showing us kindness in eternity.

But now we remind ourselves what Paul has already said – that Christ is the Head and we are the Body empowered by God to display Christ to a lost and dying world. What does God want on display? His kindness in Christ Jesus. 

Kindness means love in tender action. Now, Christ’s love was never divorced from the truth or calling sinners to repentance – it always included those things – but we want to take this reminder to heart. We are the Body, called to represent and imitate Christ. Therefore a faithful Church and a faithful Christian will be tender and kind as they move through the world. Not perfectly, because we are still sinners, but in a cultivated and growing, fruitful way.

Ephesians 2:8 – ⁸ For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift—

What is God’s gift? Scholars debate this. Is grace the gift? Is faith the gift? There are some Calvinistic interpreters that say the gift Paul is talking about is faith, meaning you have no free choice in the course of salvation. By the way, that was not how John Calvin interpreted this verse.

Contextually and grammatically, Paul is saying that salvation is the gift God gives. His point is that there is absolutely nothing a person can do to earn, merit, or bid for salvation. Every world religion is based on the idea that salvation is earned. I work off my debt, I show God I am worth saving, I claw my way into Paradise through one effort or another and thereby my reward is salvation. 

That’s not Christianity. Salvation is not won by keeping the Law or being baptized or converting a certain number of people or by speaking in tongues or by any other activity to show God how serious you are. Salvation is a gift of grace, offered to those who in no way deserve it. 

For something to actually be a gift, it must be given out of love and generosity. We’ve all bought what we called “gifts” for an event we didn’t want to go to, but in reality those weren’t gifts – they were obligations. God’s gift of salvation is something He wants to give. And the way a person receives it is through faith. 

Here is another quote about Biblical faith: Faith is “relying on something or someone believed [to be] reliable…Faith is relational, describing reliance on a reliable God. Faith is…[covenantal]…expressing the commitment and trust that bind two parties together.”

The Bible goes out of its way to say that faith is not a work. There are those who criticize the idea that people can exercise faith to receive salvation. They say, “That’s a work!” But it isn’t. In Romans 4, Paul explicitly talks about how faith is not a work, especially when it comes to receiving a gift. If I did an Oprah thing and said, “Everyone look under their seat and there are keys to a brand new car for each of you,” would any of you leave this place saying, “I, in my power, got myself a new car!”

It’s also important for us to note that there’s not a magical amount of faith that merits you salvation. How much faith did the thief of the cross have? A few minutes before he died he was blaspheming the Son of God. But then he stopped and believed and said, “Jesus, remember me when You come into Your Kingdom.” He knew so little, but it was enough because he adhered himself to the Lord.

Our faith is meant to grow and deepen and strengthen. But to receive the gift of salvation the bar is pretty low, thank God! We remember how Jesus was blown away at how much faith a centurion had. He said, “This is the biggest faith I’ve seen.” But it’s not a competition. I remember in 8th grade science our teacher set up an experiment to test lung capacity. It was one of those machines where you blow and it lifts up the ping pong ball. Everyone in the class did it and, because I’m so full of hot air, I won. It was, I think, the only physical contest I’ve ever won in life. But receiving salvation isn’t dependent on having faith strong enough to hold up the ping pong ball for however long. Remember – this gift is offered to us generously and graciously by a God Who wants us to have it.

William Arp writes, “Grace is the basic ingredient in God’s dealing with mankind; everything else comes from and builds on grace.” God is a lavish gift-giver. He wants people to have salvation.

Ephesians 2:9 – ⁹ not from works, so that no one can boast. 

No works, period. R. Kent Hughes says, “If salvation came by works, eternity would spawn a fraternity of…chest-thumping boasters — an endless line of celestial Pharisees.” But Jesus was clear to the Pharisees, especially, “Your boasting is a problem. You guys are not headed toward the Kingdom unless you actually get saved!” And many of them did in the book of Acts. 

Just as salvation is not won by works, neither is it maintained by works. Now, in a moment we’re going to see that good works, spiritual works, are to be the focus of our lives, but you do not do works in order to hold onto salvation. God is the One Who holds you tight in His grip of grace. 

Paul reminds us here of our fallen nature, that human propensity to boast and to class ourselves above other people. Ephesians reveals that we’re all equal – we’re all dead in trespasses and sins. Now, having been saved, Paul is going to show how we’re all equal in God’s sight and equal recipients of His love and grace and power. So, Christians should not be boasters in ourselves anything we’ve done. It’s wholly inappropriate. “So let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.^, For it is not the one commending himself who is approved, but the one the Lord commends.”

Ephesians 2:10 – ¹⁰ For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do. 

The word “workmanship” means “masterpiece.” What an astonishing thing to consider: The stars, the heavens, the planets in orbit – those are just God’s handiwork, but Christians are His masterwork.

A born again Christian is a magnificently unique creature. In fact, they alone are the double created – the twice baked potatoes of the spiritual world. In all seriousness, first, as a human being, you are created in the image of God. A human being is not an animal. They are a special creation, set apart from all others, both natural and supernatural. And then, to be born again means you are made into a new creation, the second birth. And that brings you into this masterpiece category. 

The term Paul uses here also means “work of art.” Salvation is more than a clean up, more than a remodel, more than a repurposing, more than an upgrade. It is the greatest work of the greatest Artist. 

Once, while Michelangelo was pounding away on a great, shapeless rock, someone asked him what he was doing. His reported answer was, “I’m liberating an angel from this stone.” In a much more profound way, God is shaping us. Chipping away edges. Bringing life where there was death. Bringing out the image of His Son through our lives in a beautiful, meticulous, artful way.

That work sometimes takes a great deal of time. Michelangelo took 3 years to carve his statue of David. He wasn’t the artist originally hired for the job. In fact, he was the third. The second fellow took a look at the block of marble that was to be used and said the quality was too poor and quit. For decades that slab sat out in the elements until Michelangelo finally took up the chisel. A number of years later, an Italian artist and biographer described Michelangelo’s work on David as, “the bringing back to life of one who was dead.”

This is what God has done for us in salvation. To put us on display as the masterpiece of His art. But, unlike the David, we’re made for more than standing in a room. Paul closes this section by telling us we were “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do.” 

We’re not saved by works, but we are definitely saved for works. God says He has special activities for each of us – things He’s planned specifically for us to discover and accomplish. Ok, so does that mean I’ve got some checklist? A spiritual “to-do” list in order to be a “good” Christian? 

The NKJV renders this phrase: “created for good works…that we should walk in them.” The ISV puts it this way, “works…to be our way of life.” God isn’t giving us quotas, He’s giving us a new life to live. This is what you do now, instead of bearing the fruit of the Devil, you bear the fruit of the Spirit. 

So, how do I discover these particular plans God has prepared beforehand for me? Hebrews 13 tells us that the God of peace will Shepherd us and equip us with everything good to do His will. As we walk with Him, sticking closely to His heart and His mind and His word, we discover where He wants to lead us and which opportunities He has set aside for us. 

And so, Paul encourages us to walk in this new life. To have a sticky faith that understands more and more what salvation really is and responds by adhering to Christ and staying on the path He has placed us on. To walk out of our graves of sin and shame and temptation and walk in the newness of that resurrection power. 

Sometimes I forget that when Jesus rose from the dead, Matthew 27 tells us that there were a number of saints who also rose and came out of their tombs and went into Jerusalem, appearing to many people. Imagine if they would’ve said, “I’m good. Gonna just stay here in my tomb.” What a waste that would’ve been! No, they were raised and came out for a good work. 

Many of you are fans of Elf. Remember that sad moment where Buddy has his etch-a-sketch and he has this itinerary planned out of things he wants to do with his dad. He has it because he loves his dad and just wants to spend time with him. His dad just dismisses him and says, “I’ve gotta go to work, Buddy.” He has no interest in Buddy’s plans and as viewers we see the heartbreak. 

The Lord has plans for us that flow from His kindness and grace and affection and tenderness for us. Paul gives us this perspective and says, “Here’s what God has been doing for you since before time began, here’s what He’s doing now, here’s the certain goal He is bringing you to.” So stick to the Savior and stick to His plan. You may feel like you only have a teaspoon of faith, but that is enough because it is God who works His power through you. All we have to do is receive His grace and submit ourselves to this ongoing process of salvation and He will finish His masterwork in us.

The Walking Dead (Ephesians 2:1-5)

Ephesians 2:1-5 – And you were dead in your trespasses and sins ² in which you previously walked according to the ways of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit now working in the disobedient. ³ We too all previously lived among them in our fleshly desires, carrying out the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts, and we were by nature children under wrath as the others were also. ⁴ But God, who is rich in mercy, because of his great love that he had for us, ⁵ made us alive with Christ even though we were dead in trespasses. You are saved by grace!

Who doesn’t love a good rags-to-riches story? It’s especially enjoyable when it’s not just about money, but there’s a positive transformation for the character. Steve Rogers is a great example. His story starts with him being weak and sick and ineffectual, but then he is transformed. Steve is no longer the powerless kid getting beatdown by every passing bully. Now he’s Captain America, empowered to fight the good fight and win with a strength and vitality that seems impossible.

In our text tonight Paul gives us a rags-to-riches story. But it’s not really a superhero tale. It’s more in the zombie/horror genre. He speaks of the walking dead and dark powers that control the world and infect the people in it. But a hero emerges – it’s the God of the Bible – Who overcomes all this evil and turns back the fatal effects of sin, rescuing people and giving them new life. 

Paul still wants us to think about the significance of salvation because he’s convinced that will make a huge difference in our lives and our relationships with the Lord. In chapter 2, he has us think about how bad our prospects were before we were rescued by God’s grace. 

Ephesians 2:1 – And you were dead in your trespasses and sins

The problem couldn’t be more direct or more dire. You were dead. Not “you were less than ideal.” Not “you were sick.” You were dead! There’s no middle ground between life and death. If you’re dead, you don’t go to a doctor to try to get better. There’s nothing that can be done. 

Death wasn’t part of God’s original purpose for His creation. It came about through trespasses and sins. Adam and Eve were told very plainly, “If you eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, in that day you will surely die.” They decided to go the death route instead of the obedience route, and so they brought sin and death into God’s perfect creation. All of Adam’s descendants inherit that death. And then we commit individual acts of rebellion and disobedience against God, because we are sinners and we are stuck in this state of death. 

This spiritual death is a big problem. We need help beyond diet and exercise. We need help beyond doctors or philosophers or the spiritualists of this world. The only thing that could possibly help us is if there was Someone Who had power over sin and could raise the dead back to life. But no human religion can do it. No regime can do it. No philosophy can do it. Because all of those things come from dead sinners, therefore they are also dead in sin. No, we need outside help.

As we’ve seen before, these opening chapters in Ephesians are hotly contested battlegrounds when it comes to Calvinistic doctrine. This verse in particular is often seized upon as proof that human beings have absolutely no part in the process of their salvation. You’ll hear quotes like, “Dead people can’t do anything.” “A dead man cannot exercise faith in Jesus Christ.” “A dead man cannot cooperate with an offer of healing.”

This leads to a shocking statement of doctrine held by Reformed scholars like R.C. Sproul who say, “Regeneration precedes faith.” That phrase is called the “essence of reformed theology.” And they will often point to Ephesians 2:1 and say, “There it is. You were dead. A dead man can do nothing, so God does everything with zero input or cooperation from the person.”

The problem is that assessment of this analogy doesn’t work in the context or in the rest of Scripture. Paul is going to say in verse 2, “you were dead…but here’s all the things you were doing. You were walking and pursuing passions and being energized by the devil.” The dead are very active in these verses. They do all sorts of things. 

Second, when Adam and Eve committed the very first sin, they were told “in the day you eat of it you will die.” God was right. They immediately died spiritually, they began to die physically, and they would’ve gone on to die eternally had God not intervened. But, even in their state of death, they were able to talk with God and answer Him and receive grace from Him. 

Third, when Jesus told the parable of the lost son, the father uses the very same word for dead that Paul uses here. It’s the word nekros. The father said, “This son of mine was dead and is alive again.” When did that transformation happen? When he “came to his senses” and chose to fall on his father’s mercy, asking for forgiveness.

Fourth, and this may be the most important. If this verse is saying, “You were dead, so you have absolutely no part in salvation, because a dead person can’t do anything,” then we run into a real problem when we get to Romans 6:11 which says that we Christians are dead to sin. Once again the same word. So, if the person in Ephesians 2 cannot act in faith toward God because they are dead in sin, how is it that we Christians are able to still disobey God if Romans tells us we are dead to sin? It’s a problem. It would suggest that if we sin we are not actually Christians. After all, to be in Christ is to be nekros to sin. 

Yes, human beings are dead in trespasses and sins. They are separated from God and totally unable to save themselves. But God frees the will in order to give us ability to either accept His offer of salvation by faith or to reject it. The majority of us here tonight have accepted this free gift and so we were dead. Now we’re alive. But if you are not a Christian, if you’ve never been born again, then you are dead in trespasses and sins. You may feel alive – You may feel like there is no problem, but the fact is this: You are dead! Sin is a fatal poison working its way through your life. You are like a zombie and there is no happy ending unless you are cured from your sin and death.

Ephesians 2:2 – ² in which you previously walked according to the ways of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit now working in the disobedient.

Zombies don’t know they’re zombies. They just stumble around doing whatever they do. That’s exactly what life is for those who aren’t Christians. But Paul goes deeper and reveals that, on top of being dead, the unsaved are enslaved to the ruler of this world. He’s identified later in the book as the Devil himself. The Devil is real. He’s called the god of this world because Adam and Eve were supposed to have dominion over the earth but instead they traded it to Satan. Now, he uses his sinister power to bring as much suffering and death and ruin to the people of earth because God loves people and Satan hates God. In 2 Timothy 2, we learn that human beings are trapped by the Devil and taken captive to do his will. 

If you’re not a Christian, the Bible is trying to help you. You may think you’re living life just fine – sure you’re not perfect, but you’re doing the best you can – but the reality is that you are a dying slave being ground into this system of sin and death. The ways of the world lead only one place and that is the grave. If you don’t repent and receive salvation in Jesus Christ, you’re going to perish.

This is why utopia is impossible, by the way. Because the world and its systems are ultimately ruled by the Devil whose whole goal is death and disobedience toward God. This is why the Lord Jesus is going to physically return one day and establish a literal Kingdom, reclaim this world and redeem it through and through, where righteousness will reign instead of sin. 

Meanwhile, people on earth think that if we just have the right laws or the right balance of powers or the right distribution of goods everything will be perfect. But it’s impossible because humanity is a bunch of corrupt, enslaved zombies living in ways that are in opposition to the goodness of God.

As Christians, this gives us an important perspective. We need to be thoughtful about how we interact and involve ourselves in the world’s systems. Don’t get me wrong – we’re supposed to go throughout the world shining the light of the Gospel and demonstrating the love of God. But we are not going to make things better unless our primary goal is to rescue the dead as we have been rescued. In a zombie movie, the living cannot cooperate with the zombies. They can’t work together to make a better tomorrow. What the zombies need is a cure. So, if you’re a Christian, Paul would have us take a look at our political action, our social engagement, our interaction with culture and society, and run it through this perspective where we realize that this world is not our home, it is ruled by the Devil who is working constant disobedience in all the ways he can. So, as we engage, our main goal is to rescue the dead, not gussy up the graves. 

Ephesians 2:3 – ³ We too all previously lived among them in our fleshly desires, carrying out the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts, and we were by nature children under wrath as the others were also.

Previously Paul spoke to Gentiles, but he includes Jews here. This is a universal problem. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

When Paul talks about the “flesh,” he doesn’t just mean the tissue that makes up your body. He means “the whole [person] oriented away from God and toward its own selfish desires.”

The flesh is a tyrant over the unsaved person and we’ve already seen that it is infected with Satan’s power. Paul is contrasting the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart of a Christian, leading to life and the work of the Devil, the “unholy spirit” in the heart of an unbeliever, leading to death.

It’s important that we recognize that not every outworking of the flesh looks bad. Paul uses himself as an example. He says, “I was a dead man, doing sinful, zombie stuff, just carrying out the inclinations of my sinful flesh.” But what was Paul doing before he became a Christian? He was totally dedicated to religion. Everything he did he did because he thought it was honoring God. He was a scholar and an expert, willing to dedicate himself to his faith. But what was his life, really? It was war against Jesus Christ. It was selfish sin. It was devilish activity dressed up as piety. We too.

Again, someone who isn’t a Christian might say, “This is all a little too much. I’m not a depraved evildoer. I could be much worse than I am. I’m just a regular person.” But this is why you need to hear what God is saying in His Living Word. You are a slave to sin. Your flesh has taken over your life. Your legitimate human needs have been distorted and corrupted and now are leading you to eternal death. Because when we live outside of God’s salvation, we are under wrath. 

Wrath is not God throwing a tantrum. It is His response to injustice. He must avenge it. He must punish evil. He must put down rebellion. Ecclesiastes 12 says, “God will bring every act to judgment, including every hidden thing, whether good or evil.”

So, the situation is dire. We were dead. Condemned. Powerless to climb out of our graves. And then Paul utters what has been called “The greatest short phrase in the history of human speech.”

Ephesians 2:4a – ⁴ But God…

Despite the failure of man, despite the power of the Devil, despite the hopelessness of our situation, we read “But God.” The main point of Ephesians 2:1-10 is that God will not stay out of the picture. He will not write us off or start over with a fresh sheet of paper. Why?

Ephesians 2:4 – ⁴ But God, who is rich in mercy, because of his great love that he had for us,

This all-powerful God is a Being of love and mercy. How rich is is His mercy? It is so great that even though we infected ourselves with sin and death, He is willing to come down and rescue us. Even though we were His enemies, He gave His own Son to die in our place so that we could have the chance to be saved. Even though we have nothing to offer Him and He has to do all the work to beautify us and remake us and restore us, He’s willing to do it because of His great love for us. 

Imagine you’re on Amazon tomorrow, buying a product you’re interested in. I’ll use a guitar pedal as an example. There it is: it’s the ugliest guitar pedal imaginable. Also it doesn’t work. It’s completely busted and ruined and inoperable. The price? All the money you have. You’ll have to sell your house and your car and empty your accounts and cash out your retirement to get it. And, even if you buy it, and even if you fix it up, a lot of the time it’s still not going to work right. It’s going to give a bunch of static at random times. Would you buy a product like that? 

The Lord did. Millions upon millions of times over. He bought you and me with His blood. That’s how rich His love and mercy are. Scholars tell us that the word Paul uses for mercy here is the same word the Septuagint uses for that Hebrew term we learned about in Genesis: hesed. That steadfast, loyal, active love that God has for us. It’s a merciful love, meaning God didn’t have to do it. With this great love and mercy, here’s what He did:

Ephesians 2:5 – [He] ⁵ made us alive with Christ even though we were dead in trespasses. You are saved by grace! 

One of the main themes of zombie moves is that, once you’re infected, it’s over. But the Lord does the impossible: He brings us back to life. This is why Paul has been marveling about salvation for more than a chapter now. And it’s not just a future thing. You were dead, now you are alive, you are saved. It is a completed action with ongoing effects. It’s all a work of His grace. We do not save ourselves. But we have the opportunity to understand what God has done and respond in faith. As the letter continues, we learn more and more about how that response works out in our lives. 

We could break this passage down and look at it from three angles. The first is for unbelievers. You need to be advised about your spiritual condition and the danger you’re in. You are dead and dying, headed for eternal death in the lake of fire. God doesn’t want you to go there, but you have to go there if you refuse to let Jesus be your substitute for sin because the wages of sin is death.

But, you too can be made alive, saved from the guilt of your sin, saved from the eternal death you are headed for. The way out is very simple: You receive God’s gift of salvation by faith. “This is the message of faith that we proclaim: If you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

The second angle is for us who are in Christ. We should be amazed at what was. We were dead. Hopeless. Helpless. Guilty. Trapped and enslaved. God cut through all of that to pull us out of the grave and lift us up to a place where death no longer has power over us, sin no longer has power over us, the Devil will no longer control us, he will flee from us if we resist him. This is the most amazing rags-to-riches story of all time and we should celebrate in our hearts what God has done. 

But then there’s the third angle of these verses. It’s also for we who believe. We should be aware of what could be. The truth is, we do still sin. We can still fall into the Devil’s traps when we make the same mistake Adam and Eve made and that’s to disobey God. Paul was talking to Christians in Romans when he said, “Do not let sin reign in your mortal body, so that you obey its desires. And do not offer any parts of it to sin as weapons for unrighteousness. But as those who are alive from the dead, offer yourselves to God.” It is possible for us to turn off the road of righteousness and take steps on the way of the world. The result is ruin and disaster. What did Jesus say to the church at Sardis? “You have a reputation for being alive, but you’re dead. Nekros. So, be alert and strengthen what remains and is about to die.” Christians must recognize that there is a war and struggle in our hearts and in this world and we have to cooperate with the sanctifying power of Christ so that we don’t turn back to sin and death. 

One way to keep our minds right on this is to evaluate whether we follow the standards of the world or if we instead see this world as dying and in need of saving through Jesus Christ. If we agree with culture, if we pass all the current standards of coolness or acceptability or open-mindedness, then we do not understand the situation properly. Romans 12:2 says, “Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” We want to dedicate our lives to help save the dead out of their death and to walk with the Lord, not in the flesh which drags us into captivity. We have all the life and all the power and all the direction we need because God has given it to us. Be alive in Christ, fight the good fight, and walk worthy with Him until we finish our course and are ushered into glory. 

Power To The People (Ephesians 1:20-23)

Ephesians 1:20-23 – ²⁰ He exercised this power in Christ by raising him from the dead and seating him at his right hand in the heavens—²¹ far above every ruler and authority, power and dominion, and every title given,^, not only in this age but also in the one to come. ²² And he subjected everything under his feet^, and appointed him as head over everything for the church, ²³ which is his body, the fullness of the one who fills all things in every way. 

The city of Ephesus was a seaside port on the west coast of modern Türkiye. A little more than 300 miles to the east was Ankara, today the nation’s capital city. In Ankara stood the most famous augusteum – a temple of worship for Rome’s first emperor. Built around 25 AD, on both walls of this temple, in Latin and Greek, was inscribed a copy of The Deeds Of The Divine Augustus – a 35 paragraph testimony that Caesar wrote about himself before his death. It begins with this line: “A copy below of the deeds of the divine Augustus, by which he subjected the whole wide earth.” He goes on to list the money he spent, the wars he won, the gifts he gave, the temples he built, and the titles he enjoyed.

The emperor cult was one of many religions in first century Asia Minor, but it was an important one to Rome. It was part of the government’s unification of the vast empire. 

Now, here you are, a Gentile Ephesian. For years the emperor cult was part of your life. Maybe you also joined a mystery religion, or even dabbled in sorcery which was so prevalent in your city. 

At some point, someone shared the Good News of Jesus Christ with you. You believed and were born again. Suddenly, you were a monotheist – unlike most everyone else in your city and neighborhood. At church one Sunday night, you hear a letter from the Jewish Christian who founded your local fellowship – an apostle who speaks with authority and finality. In this letter, Paul tells you about just how great the One true God is and how great the salvation which flows from God’s love and grace is. But, as Paul explains these things, the fundamental truths of life are being rewritten in your mind. Things like there is One God, not many gods. There is a coming Kingdom that Christians have a place in. There is an order when it comes to family, employment, citizenship, that is quite different than what the world around you practices. 

While Paul’s letter is incredibly good news, it was also incredibly countercultural. Eventually, the truths of Christianity would be considered criminal by the unbelieving world. Listening to Paul explain that Caesar is not God, Rome is not the ultimate Kingdom, you might realize just how radical Christianity was. In fact, you’d probably start piecing together why Paul was in jail – why Christians were sometimes seen as seditious traitors.

These were incredibly encouraging words, but these were ideas that shook your old Gentile understanding to its core. But Christians didn’t have to be afraid because God has limitless power – power that is presented to God’s people so that they can grow and strengthen as they walk with Him. Paul’s great desire was that these believers would become more and more spiritually enlightened to understand this hope, this power, the wealth of our salvation. 

We pick back up in verse 20. If you’re using the New King James Version, you’ll see it’s mid-sentence. That’s because, in the Greek, verses 15 through 23 are all one long sentence, so translators have to make choices about punctuation to assist the ease of reading in English. 

Paul is in a section where he’s talking about the exceeding greatness of God’s power toward those who believe.

Ephesians 1:20 – ²⁰ He exercised this power in Christ by raising him from the dead and seating him at his right hand in the heavens

The resurrection is the most important event in human history. Paul told the Corinthians, if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless.

R. Kent Hughes writes, “The cross is the highest display of God’s love…the resurrection is the ultimate display of His power.”

The best news is that it wasn’t a one-time display. Jesus was the first fruits of the resurrection power of God. Paul said it plainly: “Just as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive…Christ the first fruits, afterward, at His coming, those who belong to Christ.”

The resurrection of Jesus was God exercising His immeasurably great power. That power is also exercised for us, not only when we come out of the grave one day, but in the present. Ephesians 3:20 speaks of God’s power “that works in us.” Same word for works as is seen here for exercised. God’s power is meant to energize our lives – to bring spiritual life where there was deadness. Today we think of power and how it brings energy and heat and electromagnetism. God’s power brings life and grace and love and endurance and glory and honor and strength as we are energized by it. 

Paul also explains that Christ was seated at God’s right hand in the heavens. When Jesus came out of the grave, He didn’t come out in weakness, but in power.

Sometimes in popular culture we see a character that comes back from the dead. Most often, they come back in weakness – they come back incomplete. In The Revenant, Leonardo DiCaprio did not come out of his scrape with death in great strength. The word revenant means “a person who has returned, especially from the dead.” Or think of Wesley in The Princess Bride. He comes back from being mostly dead, but he can’t move. He has to be carried into the third act. Emperor Palpatine is back from the dead in The Rise Of Skywalker, but there’s not much of him left.

Christ came out of the grave in absolute power and glory and strength and ascended from earth to the right hand of God the Father where He rules and reigns forever. 

Now, this verse has revealed some significant truths already, but one of the most important is the fact that there is, indeed, a world beyond this one. Heaven is real. Eternity is real. We will occupy them one day. Sometimes you hear notable people debate whether they think we’re in “the matrix” – in some computer simulation or not. I saw a video of Neil Degrasse Tyson telling someone that there’s really no difference between our world and the world of Super Mario Brothers the game. And he’s supposed to be an expert on what is real and what is true. These are important, fundamental issues from which we build our lives. It matters whether this is true or not.

As a first-century Ephesian, you were told Caesar is God or that Diana is God or that there are these geographical deities or you can control otherworldly powers through magic. And Paul cuts through all of these follies and says, “There is one God. He has revealed Himself. He is in charge and He has extended an invitation for you to join His family. There is a supernatural realm and this life leads to the next one. And here are the proofs so that you can know all of this is true and here’s how you can benefit from these truths today as you live out your days in this temporal world.” 

As Paul lays out these things we learn that we live in a tension between this world and the next. Bible commentators sometimes refer to it as the “now and the not yet.” We see it here: Christ has been seated in His position of rule and authority, and yet the physical Kingdom is not yet encompassing the earth. So, Christ is King, and we Christians serve in His Kingdom, but there is also a not yet aspect to it. There is still more to come in the fulfillment of these truths. 

The tension grows even greater when we get to chapter 2 of this letter and read, “He also raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavens in Christ Jesus.” Past tense. It’s done. Yet, here we are in bodies of flesh in a temporal world with all its difficulties.

The process of God accomplishing His powerful plan isn’t over. But the important part is that it cannot be stopped. God has done these things and so they will unfold according to His glorious will. And we should remind ourselves that God is so powerful that it isn’t hard for Him. 

In every superhero movie, there comes a moment where the hero can barely overcome the problem. He has to use all his ability to hold up the bridge or fight back the enemy who is just about as strong as him. But God’s power isn’t like that. It’s immeasurably great. There’s no contest.

Ephesians 1:21 – ²¹ far above every ruler and authority, power and dominion, and every title given, not only in this age but also in the one to come.

In every category, in every place, in every time, Christ is above and in charge. And it’s not even close. He is far above every ruler, every power, every being in every age. 

Now, this was seriously counter-cultural. Archaeologists have discovered a house in Ephesus that had this written on the wall: “Rome, the ruler of all, your power will never die.” But here’s Paul saying ideas like that simply aren’t true. Rome was not the authority, Christ was. Caesar was not ultimately in charge, Christ was. And is! Not only does that give us comfort since this ultimate Authority is our Friend and Savior, but it also gives us a mindset. Because, in the end, we answer to this Lord and Savior more than we do to any earthly ruler. God has given government for the good of human society, but human government will often operate in contradiction to God’s truth and while we live as good citizens we must remind ourselves that we ultimately answer to Christ Jesus and must honor His commands. 

Paul’s reference to the age to come reminds us again that we have a place in that age. As Christians, we’ve been invited to be a part of Christ’s Kingdom. And the Bible explains that the life we live now helps prepare us for that coming age. So, we should ask ourselves: Am I dressed for that coming age? Am I saved up for it? We prepare for vacations, right? Even if you don’t use a budget normally, most people budget for a vacation. They pack and prepare and plan. Jesus says, “store up treasures in eternity. Adorn the robes of heaven. Prepare and plan for the age to come.”

Ephesians 1:22-23a – ²² And he subjected everything under his feet and appointed him as head over everything for the church, which is His body.

This stands in bold, defiance of Caesar’s claim, “I (Augustus) subjected the whole wide earth.” No, you didn’t. Christ did. And this has been the plan all along. Paul is quoting multiple Psalms in these verses, which have revealed God’s plan hundreds of years before this letter was written. Caesar was a pretender. Christ is the real deal. 

We’re told that God did this “for the church which is His body.” This continues the incredible message that Paul has been getting at for the whole chapter: Do you know what God has done for you? Here, we find that Christ is given as the Head over us as a gift to us and that we are set apart to operate as the Body of Christ, He in heaven, we on earth, working together by His power.

We are terribly unqualified for the job! But the Lord says, “That’s ok. I’ll build you up. I’ll empower you. I’ll lead you. I’ll gift you. I’ll help you and protect you. But you are My Body now.” 

In Augustus’ Divine Deeds scroll he said, “[I] subjected the whole wide earth to the rule of the Roman people.” But did he, really? Did he actually share his throne? The Lord Jesus does! 

In the Millennium we will govern with the Lord. He shares His Kingdom with us. We’re told we’re going to judge angels! And when we see glimpses of the Millennium in the prophetic books of the Bible, we see that it’s a time of great activity. All sorts of things are happening. Paul has us thinking about the age to come and the power of God and how we operate as His Body. It’s good to remind ourselves that the coming age is not a time of inactivity. We’re going to be very busy as God continues to energize us and as we finally are able to live as sinless, glorified people. 

So, if this is already done, as Paul says, and if everything that is subjected under Christ is also subjected under His Church, since we are His Body, why do we experience so much difficulty and frustration and feel powerless in this life?

Thomas Neufeld writes, “God’s order of creation and salvation is still in the process of being realized in Christ. Such transformation is neither momentary nor without conflict and struggle.”

It’s not that it might not happen, but that it is still happening. And so Paul wrote, hoping the Ephesians would understand more of what is true, what is given to us, what is possible as we walk in the power of God so that we could grow in strength and hope and effectiveness. 

The whole point is that Paul wants us to know the incredible potential and privilege we have as saved people in the church, but also that this great privilege comes with important, counter-cultural, right-now responsibilities. And so, in this salvation, full of blessings and benefits and power, we are called to complete participation with what God is doing, allowing Christ to be our head in every way, operating as His Body, filled with His power but subordinate to His leading.

Verse 23 continues:

Ephesians 1:23b – the fullness of the one who fills all things in every way. 

Scholars call this the hardest phrase in the book, maybe in all the New Testament. The Greek grammar is vague and Paul even rhymed many of these words. Who is filling and who is being filled? There’s debate, but the overall message is this: The Church is the special beneficiary of God’s powerful filling, and the Church is implicated in the filling work of God.

Paul will go on to show us how we live in this cooperative relationship with Christ. He fills us and we fill up with Him. God is filling us full, He is accomplishing His glorious, sanctifying work by His power, but at the same time, we cooperate by using that energy to “build up the body of Christ…growing into maturity with a stature measured by Christ’s fullness.”

The picture he uses is a head and a body. The head with the central nervous system, with the directing power, the place of thought and understanding and and personality and decision, but then those directives being carried out by the body, which has life and strength and mobility. 

In this analogy, it’s the head that matters, right? I read an article titled, “How Many Organs In The Body Could You Live Without?” It said this, “You can still have a fairly normal life without one of your lungs, a kidney, your spleen, appendix, gall bladder, adenoids, tonsils, plus some of your lymph nodes, the fibula bones from each leg and six of your ribs…If you allow yourself artificial replacements and medication, we can go further and remove your stomach, colon, pancreas, salivary glands, thyroid, bladder and your other kidney. Still not enough for you? Theoretically, surgeons could amputate all of your limbs, and remove your eyes, nose, ears, larynx, tongue, lower spine and rectum.” But there’s no living without the head. The head is all-important. But the head wants eyes and kidneys and salivary glands and lungs. 

This is an amazing revelation: God wants to act, He wants to express His powerful work on the earth. And to accomplish that, He’s decided He wants you as part of His body – a representative group of people that act in His place on the earth, with His power and authority. It’s amazing that He is willing to limit Himself in this way. God the Son took on a body forever because of His great love for us. And now, He goes further and says, “I’m not going to stay on the earth and walk around as the Risen GodMan. No, I’m going to ascend to heaven and now YOU are My Body on the earth. I will act through you. And so that you can be My body I will give you power and filling and gifting and all the directives you need.” We, the assembly, the ekklesia, are called out to live as the Body, energized by the mighty power of God, filled with His fullness and filling with Him according to His purposes. Filling the earth with His grace. Filling up in our flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ. Filling our little spheres of influence with ministry and generosity and endurance in suffering and with Gospel truth. Filled full with this power that has been given to us, not by a dead Caesar, but by the Living Lord. 

Our hostile world refuses to believe in this Savior, despite proofs like the resurrection. The world settles for building empty memorials for dead men who claim to be great. Augustus was decaying in the dirt while they carved on wall of an empty temple how powerful he was and how grateful the Roman people should be for all he did for himself. 

Meanwhile, Christ Jesus lives in heaven and says, “I am building you as My Temple. And My Temple isn’t full of dead men’s bones, it’s full of life and power.” What a complete re-understanding of reality for the Ephesians. This was a radical change in their understanding of reality. That’s what the opening of this letter is all about. You Christians, do you realize what God has done? Do you realize what that means? Do you realize what is possible because of God’s power given to you? It’s Paul’s hope that they would understand and that we would understand so that God’s truth and power and goodness could be made known through us, the church, as the Lord energizes us and builds us up. 

But Wait, There’s More! (Ephesians 1:15-19)

Ephesians 1:15-19 – ¹⁵ This is why, since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, ¹⁶ I never stop giving thanks for you as I remember you in my prayers. ¹⁷ I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, would give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him. ¹⁸ I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so that you may know what is the hope of his calling, what is the wealth of his glorious inheritance in the saints, ¹⁹ and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the mighty working of his strength. 

But wait, there’s more! That’s been a motto of informercial hosts for a long time. It’s often associated with Billy Mays, the peddler of OxiClean, but it was the fine folks over at Ginsu knives who first used it in their commercials in the 70’s. One media scholar has called it “the pitch of all pitches.”

Paul was no informercial salesman, but he was overflowing with joy and enthusiasm as he told the Ephesians about the blessings of salvation. In verses 3 through 14, he wrote a song in one, long sentence, expounding the riches of God’s grace. He pauses for a breath and then pours out another single sentence stretching from verse 15 through 23, this time not a song, but a prayer. 

It’s a special thing to be able to examine the prayer life of an apostle. On the one hand, they were people like us. They had struggles and shortcomings. God didn’t love them more than He loves us. But, on the other hand, they obviously had a depth of faith and experience and relationship with the Lord that we aspire to. Paul said to the Corinthians, “Imitate me, as I imitate Christ.” So, getting a glimpse into Paul’s prayer life is a valuable thing. 

In his prayer, we see once again that Paul was convinced that the more Christians understand about what the Lord has done for them, the more they will be able to thrive and grow and experience the benefits of salvation. After a long explanation of the mind-blowing advantages of life in Christ, he says “But wait, there’s more!” and keeps detailing the blessings for us. 

Ephesians 1:15 –  ¹⁵ This is why, since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints,

Reading this verse, critics sometimes suggest that Paul wasn’t the real author of Ephesians. After all, Paul had spent years in the city, and verses like this (they say) suggest he didn’t know his audience. The truth is, it had been five or seven years since Paul was with them. Many people had been saved since then. He probably didn’t know most of the church members at this point. But even though he hadn’t met many of them personally, he had heard the testimony of their faith and their love. 

That’s pretty remarkable for a world without phones, newspapers, social media, television, radio, telegram, blogs, or anything else that helps news travel. But God was moving the witness of His Good News all over the world, because that’s what He loves to do.

God wants to build a testimony in your life and then broadcast the news of His grace through you. That doesn’t mean every Christian is going to be in ‘influencer’ or preach to thousands of people or have books written about their lives. But God wants you and I to be His witnesses, the word Jesus used in Acts 1:8 was martyrs, with lives laid down for His purpose and His glory. 

The Ephesians didn’t run ad campaigns. They didn’t go viral for some stunt. They were regular Christians living regular lives – but lives full of faith in the Lord Jesus and love for all the saints. 

The term that Paul used for faith is defined by words like constancy in profession, reliance upon Christ, belief, fidelity, conviction. Their faith wasn’t in Paul, it was in the GodMan. He was not only the real Jesus, Who really lived and really spoke and really did the things the Bible records for us, but He is also Lord. He is the Lord of all lords, the King of all kings. He is Ruler of the cosmos and Lord over our lives. He is the Head, the Decider, the Master and Commander.

Paul also heard about their love for all the saints. In this case, Paul was not referencing the brotherly love of philadelphia, but agape love. Agape love is a supernatural love. It’s the love that God pours out in the hearts of Christians through the Holy Spirit. But, as one commentator points out, agape love is one we choose to express. It is “a thoughtful, volitional, purposeful love that wills to love even the unlovely.” It doesn’t happen by accident but by choice. It’s a particular love that we’re called to exercise. 

The agape love of God is one of the many gifts given to us in salvation. But Christians sometimes have a hard time loving others. Even in the book of Acts, we see that the Jewish Christians often struggled to love Gentile believers, or even other Jewish believers who were Hellenist in culture. 

We struggle today with those who are unlovely to us for one reason or another. But the love of God calls us to love all the saints. 

Doctors recommend that you get bloodwork done once a year to check a variety of levels. In a similar way, evaluating our things like our faith in the Lord Jesus and our love for the saints is an important measurement to take from time to time. In Paul’s mind, these were acid tests of Christianity. Examining these elements of our religion is important. For example: Our love for others is connected to our love for God. John would later write, “The person who does not love his brother or sister whom he has seen cannot love God whom He has not seen.” 

A number of years after Paul wrote them, the Church at Ephesus would receive another letter – this time from Jesus Christ Himself. And He would say, “Your faith is doing really well. I know your works, your labor, and your endurance, and that you cannot tolerate evil people. You have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and you have found them to be liars. I know that you have persevered and endured hardships for the sake of my name, and you have not grown weary.” But, He then said, “You’ve abandoned the love you had at first.” 

A Christian and a church needs both faith and love. Today, many churches have faith but no love. Some churches have a lot of love but no content to their faith. We’re called to both. A growing faith in the Lord Jesus and a growing love for all the saints.

Our tendency might be to then say, “Well, I have to force myself to love others.” Or, “I have to generate acts of faith.” That’s not the Biblical way of thinking about it. Faith and love are gifts that God pours out in our lives. Our calling as Christians is to receive those gifts, allow them to operate, and continually cultivate them in our lives by the power of God’s grace. 

Ephesians 1:16 – ¹⁶ I never stop giving thanks for you as I remember you in my prayers. 

What an encouragement this must have been. Paul not only heard about them, he made mention of them as he prayed to God, not just once but on a regular basis. 

There are a lot of things Paul could pray about. By the time he wrote this letter he had already died and gone to heaven and come back to life, which he reported on in Second Corinthians. But he had a genuine care for these churches he was involved with. He cared about their spiritual health. He was excited to hear that they were continuing to grow in their faith. Their spiritual success was something to celebrate because Paul understood that it’s all one Body. If one part is flourishing, that’s good for the whole Body. He wasn’t jealous that people were talking about the Ephesians or thinking, “you’d be nothing without me!” He took time to thank God for them. 

On top of that, we see he was practicing what he preached. In chapter 6 he will command them to pray at all times for all the saints and he’ll say, “Pray also for me.” But he didn’t tell them to do things that he didn’t do. He is a true example of humble, powerful, exercising Christianity for us. 

Ephesians 1:17 – ¹⁷ I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, would give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him.

Hadn’t they already received the Holy Spirit? Paul was very clear in verse verses 13 and 14 of this chapter that they were sealed with the Holy Spirit, the down payment of our inheritance. 

Back in Acts 19, when Paul first came to the city, he met with some disciples and he said, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” And they answered, “We haven’t even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” And then Paul laid his hands on them and the Holy Spirit came down on them. 

So what is Paul saying here? Well, scholars debate whether Paul mean the Holy Spirit in this verse or spirit with a small s – speaking of an attitude or tilt of the heart. Either way, Paul’s writings reveal that our relationship to God is meant to always been deepening, always developing, always growing in our understanding of Who He is and what He has called us to. 

Paul prays that God the Father would give them more wisdom, more revelation, so they could have a greater knowledge of Him. R. Kent Hughes writes, “The regular Greek word for personal knowing is gnosis, but here the word is intensified with the preposition epi. Paul is asking for…a ‘real, deep, full knowledge.’” Hughes continues, “The great need of any church, whether it is healthy or not, is knowing Christ – a better, deeper, fuller knowledge of Christ.”

Paul wanted this not only for the Ephesians, and not only for us, but also for himself. Listen to this remarkable statement from Philippians chapter 3:

Philippians 3:10, 12 – ¹⁰ My goal is to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death…¹² Not that I have already reached the goal or am already perfect, but I make every effort to take hold of it because I also have been taken hold of by Christ Jesus.

So Paul, who saw Jesus face-to-face multiple times, Paul who wrote over a dozen books of the New Testament, Paul who had seen a vision of heaven itself, that Pull said, “My goal is to know God more and I do not consider myself to have attained this goal yet.” 

The Apostle prayed that God the Father would give the Ephesians more knowledge and more wisdom. The knowledge of God he’s talking about must come from God Himself. I saw a YouTube video the other day from a very popular social commentator and philosopher who has millions of followers, and he was talking about his understanding of what the Ten Commandments mean. And he said “how I like to look at it is…” and then went on to say that each person must simply find their own god so as not to have many gods and give into vice or greed or aimlessness. Of course, he’s completely wrong. His understanding of God comes from himself. But knowledge of God has to come from God. That is why God has gone to so much trouble to reveal Himself and protect that revelation, so that we might know Him deeply and personally and accurately. 

John Phillips writes, “‘Get to know [God]’ is Paul’s basic answer to all of life’s problems and perplexities.” Getting to know God is a lifelong pursuit for every Christian. It was for Paul. It’s not just that “I know enough to be saved,” or, “I memorized the entire Bible.” Even if you did, there is still more to know of the God Who made you and saved you and loves you, just as there is always more you could learn of your parents or your spouse or your best friend. Because God is a Person. 

Now, on a practical level, how can I know more God? How can I receive more of this wisdom and knowledge and revelation that Paul is talking about? Listen to 1 Corinthians 2: 

1 Corinthians 2:10-11 – ¹⁰ Now God has revealed these things to us by the Spirit, since the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. ¹¹ For who knows a person’s thoughts except his spirit within him? In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.

So, it is fellowship with the Spirit that reveals these things. We fellowship with Him by going to the Scripture, which He inspired and with which He guides us in all truth. But we also fellowship with the Holy Spirit as we would with a friend because He is our Friend, He is dwelling in our hearts, and He is a Person, just as Jesus and the Father are. 

There are clear principles in Scripture that show how to get the wisdom of God. Seek it, ask for it, and regularly consider the word we’ve already received. Daniel was reading what Jeremiah wrote, as he probably had many, many times before, but as he considered and prayed and fellowshipped with the Lord, he says, “I understood…the word of the Lord.” He had harvest of wisdom that day.

Let’s remind ourselves that Paul’s prayer was not for a certain, special class of Christians, but for all of them. Paul is referencing all of these incredible things as part of the regular, ordinary Christian life. He expected this to be the reality for all the believers in Ephesus and elsewhere.

Ephesians 1:18-19 – ¹⁸ I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so that you may know what is the hope of his calling, what is the wealth of his glorious inheritance in the saints, ¹⁹ and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the mighty working of his strength. 

This is where the “But wait, there’s more” really kicks in. Paul references hope, wealth, and power sent by God for us who believe. We have a living hope that secures our future and gives us all the orientation needed to direct our lives. As we head forward in that hope, God acts powerfully on our behalf. In describing the enormous power of God, Paul uses four different Greek synonyms to stack up the image of God’s might and how He sends that power out for us. There is no foe, there is no trial, there is no hurt, there is no fear, there is no problem, there is no shortcoming, there is no obstacle that God’s power cannot overwhelm. God’s power surpasses everything. And the Lord says, “that power is being activated for My people as they walk with Me.” 

Did you notice that Paul lumped the Ephesians in with himself? “His power toward us who believe.” He says, “you Ephesians are in the same boat as me and the other apostles.” You and I, here tonight, are objects of God’s tender care and powerful work. What was true in Acts is true today.

We skipped the second item in Paul’s “but wait, there’s more” list here. When Paul talks about the wealth of the glorious inheritance, he’s not talking about our inheritance like he did earlier in the chapter. He’s talking about the fact that we are the Lord’s inheritance. Paul is revealing the matchless value that God places on you as His special possession.

Before the foundation of the world, God made a plan so that you could have hope and power and peace and joy and purpose in the eternal work of God your Father. You are a special treasure that He holds in His hands and focuses His attention on. You are the thing God has set aside for Himself to bring Him glory and to enjoy His love and give Him love back. He has made a place in eternity for you. He has opened the storehouses of heaven on your behalf. He has carved out of time and space an individualized life so that you might know Him and know His love and know His power working in and through you. 

Then, Lord, if this is meant to be the regular, everyday life of a Christian, why don’t we feel or experience these things as plainly as we want to? Even Paul himself said, “Listen, I live to know God and His power, but I haven’t attained it fully yet. So I reach forward, pursuing the prize.” And he went on to say, “Let all who are mature think this way.”

Right now, it’s true, we only know in part, but one day we’ll know fully. Right now we see only a reflection as in a mirror, but one day face-to-face with the Lord Who loves us so. Meanwhile, God has shed faith, hope, and love into our hearts that we may grow in our knowledge of Him. 

As we walk with God we discover more and more of Who He is and what He has done. And as these truths take root in our hearts, our faith grows and our faith produces love. Paul told the Ephesians, “That’s what’s happening in your lives and I’m so excited about it and I pray that it keeps happening more and more.” He didn’t talk to them about doing more events or hitting certain quotas. He didn’t talk to them about the metrics of their influence. In this prayer he “congratulate[d] his readers for displaying precisely the quality that he will urge them later in the letter to cultivate.”

He said these things are true now, so understand more of that truth and cooperate with God in His desire to expand your experience of your salvation. Toward that end, Paul was excited, because these young Christians in Ephesus were walking in faith, they were living in love. Elsewhere, Paul said to the Galatians: “In Christ Jesus…what matters is faith working through love.”

But we know the Ephesians eventually stopped experiencing a significant aspect of their Christianity. They abandoned their first love. The blessings of our Christian faith have been given, but they’re not a given in our personal lives or in our church if we don’t actively walk in them. The way forward is to know God, pursue Him, and enjoy more and more of the salvation He has provided. 

The More You Know (Ephesians 1:7-14)

Since 1989, NBC has aired public service announcements under the banner The More You Know. The very first segment featured Tom Brokaw. For 34 years, TV actors, sports stars, and even presidents have appeared with the goal of bringing us “as much information as possible” about certain topics. Of course, the commercials are only 30 seconds long, so I’m not sure they’re hitting that “as much information as possible” target. 

One of Paul’s major goals in writing to the Ephesians was to help them understand what it really means to be in Christ. He said, “I keep asking that…God…may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better.”

In chapter 3 he prays that Christians would be rooted and established and able to comprehend God’s love for them. The more we know, the more our lives will be full of the fullness of God.

As we saw last time, the letter opens with an ecstatic, three-stanza song, describing the wonders of salvation. The first section is about God’s work in the past – the plan of election and predestination and how that provides the way for us to be adopted into the family of God. Next the song turns to the present and the future – how God’s redemptive plan brings immeasurable blessings for both.

Ephesians 1:7 – ⁷ In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace

Redemption means that we were captives, we were slaves, but God paid a ransom to set us free, and purchase us for Himself. It could only be done by the blood of Jesus Christ. There is no other way for a person to be saved – there’s no other path that leads to heaven. Paul says it right here: You have redemption through the blood of Christ. But Hebrews is even more explicit:

Hebrews 9:22b – without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.

In pagan religions, blood was brought to appease angry gods. That’s not what’s happening between Jesus and the Father. Instead, God uses His greatest treasure to pay for our debt. One commentator writes, “Grace is not something God gives us; rather, it is God’s giving us Himself.”

If you are in Christ, you have been liberated from sin. You are no longer its prisoner. You no longer have to live under its tyrannical power. But, on top of that, along with redemption God gives us forgiveness. That’s an important extra. 

Have you ever wronged someone, maybe broken one of their things, and after you squared the debt, you could tell they still held resentment against you in their hearts? God makes it very clear that He not only frees us, He forgives us in Christ. In Hebrews 8, God says: “I will forgive their wrongdoing and I will never again remember their sins.”

What a wonderful announcement Paul was giving them. Of course, it’s easy for us to overlook that some of the members of the church receiving this letter actually were slaves. One quarter of the city’s population were slaves. If I were one of the slaves hearing this message, I might think, “How about some practical liberation for me right now.” Why wasn’t that on the table?

Ephesians 1:8 – ⁸ that he richly poured out on us with all wisdom and understanding.

God’s grace has been poured out. We’re want to be all about grace here at Calvary. We want it to be definitive of how we think about God and how we relate to others. We believe grace changes everything. God has poured out so much grace that it far outpaces the volume and power of sin in our world. Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. There is more than enough for all of the problems that have multiplied throughout the world. That grace is for you and works through you.

Part of the benefit of God’s grace is that we are able to receive all wisdom and understanding. Wisdom means knowing God and our relation to Him. Understanding means knowing how to live faithfully in concrete situations. R. Kent Hughes writes, “Those [equipped with wisdom and understanding] can discern the spirit of the times and stand tall and confident.”

Coming out of paganism, the Ephesians needed a new moral compass. They needed a new philosophy. Many of them had been steeped in sorcery and the occult. They came and burned their magic books and joined the church. Now Paul is telling them they have the instruction and revelation necessary to understand life and navigate rightly. 

Ephesians 1:9-10 – ⁹ He made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he purposed in Christ ¹⁰ as a plan for the right time—to bring everything together in Christ, both things in heaven and things on earth in him. 

To us, the word “mystery” means something vague, shrouded, unknown. In the Bible, the term is not used that way. Martyn Lloyd-Jones said, “The word mystery in the New Testament does not mean something that is incomprehensible to the human mind, but is rather something that is undiscoverable by the unaided human mind.”

A mystery in the New Testament is a teaching that God specifically reveals to His people that we wouldn’t have been able to figure out on our own. The mystery here in verses 9 and 10 is that God’s will was to bring everything in heaven and on earth together in Christ. The International Standard Version has a helpful translation:

Ephesians 1:10 (ISV) – [God’s plan is] ¹⁰to usher in the fullness of the times and to gather up all things in Christ, both things in heaven and things on earth.

This would have special significance to the Ephesians because they were surrounded by what were called “mystery religions.” They were super-secret cults with strange and awful initiation rituals. “Partakers committed sacrilege if they divulged what happened during these ceremonies.” From what we know, some of their practices were perverted copies of Christian truth. They saw their cult as a brotherhood. Their initiation rituals usually mimed death and resurrection. Confession was expected, followed by baptism. And, there’s record of a rite held where participants distributed and ate the roasted heart of a child – a satanic forgery of communion.

So now Paul says, “No, in Christianity, the truths of God are not on a secret, need-to-know basis. Anyone is welcome to receive the whole truth about the plan of God.” Jesus told His disciples “the secrets of the kingdom of heaven have been given to you to know.” Paul explained to the Corinthians that God reveals everything by the Spirit for those who love Him.

Christ is gathering up all things to Himself. That doesn’t mean everyone is going to be saved in the end, it means there is nothing that will slip through His fingers.

God accomplishes His plan differently in different ages. I’m reading out of the CSB version, and when we do, there’s an important term that gets hidden away – it’s the word dispensation. You see it in the New King James Version. Your version might use the word “administration.” 

God administrates His redemptive program in different ways at different times. The plainest example is the fact that we no longer bring lambs to church for sacrifice. That administration is over. Classical dispensationalism identifies seven different administrations. People are always saved the same way – by grace through faith – but the way God interacts with man, His arrangements with them, and His focus is different in each dispensation. Here at Calvary, we are dispensationalist. It’s not an essential doctrine, but it influences our understanding of God’s plan, the prophecies found in Scripture, the importance of the nation of Israel, and the way we interpret the Bible.  

Dispensationalists sometimes get a bad rap out in the wider Christian world. Years ago I was talking with a friend and I asked him if he was reading anything interesting and he told me he was reading a book on how to talk to dispensationalists. And he proceeded to say dispensationalists miss the main thing Jesus talked about and never talk about the Kingdom of God and they’re all cessationists. So I said, “Well, as a dispensationalist, I don’t think you’re right about what we believe.” It seemed obvious to me he had never actually read anything a dispensationalist like Charles Ryrie had written or talked to a living, breathing dispensationalist. 

But here, Paul’s point is that Christ is gathering up all things so that when the fullness of time comes, all will be accomplished according to His gracious will. This is why some of the Ephesians would remain slaves. This is why you and I will suffer. We live in a fallen world, racked by sin, but God’s long-suffering waits because His desire is that people would get saved. 

When the Twin Towers came down on September 11, thousands of first responders rushed into the carnage in an effort to save people stuck in the rubble. After 27 hours, only 20 survivors were pulled out. In the 20 years since, more survivors and first responders have died from the toxins they were exposed to than died in the attack itself. 2,974 people lost their lives when the Towers fell. 4,343 have died as a result of being there after the destruction, particularly first responders. 

Was it worth it for all those people to rush in and sacrifice themselves? Well, the 20 people pulled out of the rubble certainly think so. Their families do, too. The lost are worth saving. 

As we suffer, we often want it to end. End the slavery. End the sadness. It will one day, in the fullness of time. But, for the time being, God’s long-suffering waits, allowing us to endure with His grace and strength and peace and joy, so that more can be gathered in. You know, Paul wanted to get to glory, too. But he understood the importance of God’s work. And he said in Philippians, “It would be better to get to heaven, but to live on in the flesh means fruitful work for me.” 

40 billion people have been born on the earth since Christ died, including you and me. I’m glad His long-suffering waited for me. Who else is He waiting for? Who is He sending me after?

Ephesians 1:11 – ¹¹ In him we have also received an inheritance, because we were predestined according to the plan of the one who works out everything in agreement with the purpose of his will,

We have received an inheritance. It’s done. It’s ours. You are not on probation with God, you’re adopted! He signed the paper with His own blood.

The word Paul uses for plan here is not the same one he used before. Here it means purpose but it also is a word used for the showbread in the Tabernacle and Temple. This highlights the fact that God has not only given us an inheritance, but that we are His inheritance. Thomas Neufeld writes, “In bringing into being a worshiping community, God has given himself a present!”

Our predestined purpose is to bring God praise and glory. Like the showbread, in the coming ages we will be put on display as an example of the immeasurable riches of God’s grace and kindness.

So, since it’s all done, does that mean I can just coast? I can be a spiritual trust-fund baby and cash in once I get to eternity? No. God calls us to activity and investment right now because we are His children. There is Kingdom work to do now. Jesus told us to store up treasures in heaven. John said, 

2 John 8 – ⁸ Watch yourselves so that you don’t lose what we have worked for, but that you may receive a full reward.

As we receive these diverse blessings from God, we are able to exercise our faith, invest in His Kingdom, and cooperate with the plan He is accomplishing – to enjoy and enhance our inheritance.

Ephesians 1:12 –  ¹² so that we who had already put our hope in Christ might bring praise to his glory. 

Notice the language of choice here. Man’s free will is a given in this song. 

“Might bring praise to His glory” is a phrase I find hard to get a handle on. Once again, the ISV is helpful. “So that we…might live for his praise and glory.” Those are the goals of our lives. How can I praise God? How can I glorify Him? These are base functions of every Christian life, day-by-day. 

As we stand back a little from the song, we see Paul excited about the fact that believers can know, can understand, can be constantly growing and deepening. Paul is describing a relationship with God that is strong and confident and well built. He’ll later say, “I pray that you guys would be rooted and established. God wants you to realize and understand all this stuff.” 

Our modern, Christian culture sometimes celebrates unknowing, weakness, vagueness, the emotional experience of what’s called “brokenness.” All I can say is that Paul’s song is totally the opposite. God’s desire is that you and I have wisdom and hope and confidence and clarity and assurance so that we can more and more experience His fullness in all aspects of our lives. 

Ephesians 1:13 – ¹³You, too, have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed in him you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit,

This is another significant verse, especially given the debate over the doctrine of election that we talked about last time. When were you sealed in the Holy Spirit? In eternity past when God picked you but not the person next to you? No. You were sealed when you heard the Gospel and believed. 

This is why the preaching of the Gospel is so essential. And it’s why we should take our commission to preach very seriously. 

Romans 10:14 – ¹⁴ How, then, can they call on him they have not believed in? And how can they believe without hearing about him? And how can they hear without a preacher?

We see the Trinity represented in Paul’s song. The Father electing, the Son redeeming, the Spirit sealing. One God in Three Persons. 

This sealing work of the Spirit speaks of God’s authentic guarantee to do what He has promised. Seals were used on documents or placed on cargo before shipping. The Holy Spirit does a lot in our lives, but part of what He does is guarantee the promises of God. He guarantees that we won’t be abandoned, that we will be protected from the enemy, that God will renew us, that He will help us in our weakness, and so much more. 

And, again, He’s not just given us a token. To guarantee His promises, God gives us Himself. He is always going to the furthest extremes of care and compassion and tenderness toward us. 

Ephesians 1:14 – ¹⁴ The Holy Spirit is the down payment of our inheritance, until the redemption of the possession, to the praise of his glory. 

If the Holy Spirit is just the down payment…how rich is our inheritance? Think of a down payment on a house. 5%, 10%, 20%. Compared to what you pay in the end, it’s a small amount. God says that the Holy Spirit, with all His power and presence and goodness and generosity is just the down payment of all we’ll receive in the end. What an incredible thought!

Back in 1989, when The More You Know started, the ads focused on negative things. In that first commercial, Tom Brokaw said, “The more you know about an impending disaster, the more likely you are to do something about it.” The ads were designed to “make you familiar with [deepening crises] and terrible situations” because, “as citizens our job is to do something about it.”

Paul didn’t focus on the negative or difficult aspects of life. This song is all about blessing and joy and richness and the glories of being a Christian – that we have something to celebrate! Meanwhile, he was writing with a heavy chain tying him to a Roman guard. A fact he doesn’t bother to mention until chapter 6. 

Some of the Ephesians were slaves. Some were suffering. All would struggle in one way or another. But Paul draws their attention to what God has done, what’s He is doing, and what He has promised to do in the future on our behalf. This is the plan. This is the Christian life. This is our well-informed, strong and fruitful hope. The more we know about that, the more we’re able to put our lives in perspective and the rest in the fact that God is caring for us and will go above and beyond what we could ever ask or imagine as He works out His loving work in our lives.

Ephesians 1:3-6 – With Great Predestination Comes Great Responsibility

Ephesians 1:3-6 – ³ Blessed is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavens in Christ. ⁴ For he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless in love before him. ⁵ He predestined us to be adopted as sons through Jesus Christ for himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, ⁶ to the praise of his glorious grace that he lavished on us in the Beloved One. 

I was surprised to learn that Johnny Cash’s iconic song A Boy Named Sue wasn’t written by the Man in Black, but by someone quite unexpected: Shel Silverstein, the celebrated children’s author of The Giving Tree and Giraffe And A Half.^[1]

In Ephesians 1:3-14, Paul praises God for His eternal plan of salvation. But this passage is not a dry, doctrinal dissertation. It is a hymn broken up into three stanzas.^[2] Maybe you’ve already heard that, in the Greek, verses 3 through 14 are one long, unbroken sentence of 202 words.^[3] Some scholars actually criticize Paul for it. One calls it a clumsy and monstrous sentence.^[4] Another says, “[Verses 3-14 are] Lengthy, cumbersome phrases, weighed down with chains of synonyms and nouns qualified by overloaded adjectives.”^[5] Everyone’s a critic! Complaints like these miss the point. Paul is giving us a song. It’s fitting since he will later expressly command Christians to speak to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs.^[6]

Paul’s song, in essence, says, “Can you believe what God has done?” It is a song about the wonders and significance of salvation.^[7] It’s dense. It begins by highlighting five elements of God’s salvation which are umbrella categories under which we receive thousands of blessings from God.^[8]

It’s important that we recognize that this passage is not primarily doctrinal, but is an act of passionate praise to God.^[9] When we bring it into English and into the doctrinal battlefield, it’s easy to lose sight of the original purpose of the song. Thomas Neufeld writes, “A price is paid for this ease of reading…We lose the experience of reading or hearing the passage as one long, unbroken, deliberately exhausting recitation of how God has blessed us.”^[10]

Paul’s song celebrates God’s blessings and reminds us of the consequences and responsibilities we now have as a result. It reminds us of the greatness of God. And the song reminds us that this life with Christ is only going to get better. We’re living now just in the down payment stage.

But, this section of Scripture is a doctrinal battleground. As I read our verses maybe you had that feeling…it’s like the feeling when April 15th comes around…that feeling that a bill is coming due. I’ve got good news: Tax day isn’t April 15th. It isn’t even April 18th – not for Californians. Due to storms, mudslides and other natural disasters this winter, the IRS has given residents of Alabama, California and Georgia until October 16, 2023 to file!

But we’re talking about doctrine here. As we read these verses, maybe it felt like Calvinism came knocking with its doctrine of unconditional election. Robert Dale writes, “On the first few verses of this epistle the Calvinistic theory of election and predestination has been supposed to rest as on foundations of eternal granite.”^[11]

Is that true? This isn’t the only passage where election is debated, but it’s one of the major ones. Calvinist doctrine interprets verses 4 and 5 as saying that God, in eternity past, picked some human beings to be saved and the rest to be damned. Now, before I continue, let me say that we love our Reformed brothers and sisters. I’m not saying they’re not Christians or anything like that. But this is a doctrinal hill on which we are willing to contend.

One Calvinistic scholar writes, “verse four…specifies the action of God in eternity whereby He has fixed in advance the destiny of certain people.”^[12] That Paul is describing God’s “selection of certain people, to the exclusion of certain others.” But is that what Paul is saying? 

There’s an incredibly important phrase in Paul’s song – one he uses often in his writings, but ten times between verses 3 and 14, and that’s the phrase “in Christ.” Look at verse four again: God “chose us in Him before the foundation of the world.” Let’s pause to consider what is actually being said contextually and the implications of our interpretation versus the Calvinistic interpretation. 

At this point that many Calvinists will say, “Ephesians says God chose who would be saved from eternity past. We can’t understand how that squares with Him being a God of love, but His ways are higher than our ways, so don’t even question it.” We would say, “No, we’re allowed to question that interpretation. Because, if that is true, then God’s character is much different than if it isn’t true.” 

The entire context of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians is group, community, the universalness of the Church and the ongoing work of God through the Body He is building. Klyne Snodgrass writes, “Usually when people speak of divine election, they think of the election of individuals and the benefit to them. But biblical texts have a different emphasis, for election is primarily a corporate term. Nothing in Ephesians 1 focuses on individuals; rather, the text focuses collectively on those who are in Christ. This changes the theology.”^[13]

In Scripture, God repeatedly uses an individual to be the federal representative for a future group. Adam was mankind’s representative and through Adam we all inherit sin. You didn’t sin in the Garden of Eden, but you are included in the fall because you were represented by Adam. Abraham was the representative of a special people who would later become the nation of Israel, who received the promises and plans of God through their relationship to Abraham.

Christ is the most important representative. He is the Lamb. He is the Head. He is the Chosen Servant. Now, anyone who is in Christ is able to receive the blessings of salvation. From eternity past, “God has directed that we be adopted as sons.”^[14] Who is the ‘we’ in Paul’s statement? All who are in Christ. So we would distill the dense phrases of Paul’s song this statement by Frank Thielman: God has “determined in advance that those who are in Christ would be His people.”^[15] Or, if you’d like, “Once in Christ we are caught in the currents of the eternal purposes of the Divine love.”^[16]

Now, if that doesn’t shake the specter of Calvinistic doctrine off your shoulder, here are a few implications and questions we can discuss in order to, hopefully, bring more clarity to Ephesians 1. 

Calvinistic doctrine, interpreting Ephesians 1:4, would suggest that chosen people were in Christ before the foundations of the world.^[17] But this contradicts several plain statements in Scripture. 

Number one: Paul said in Romans 16, “Greet Andronicus and Junia, my fellow Jews…they were in Christ before me.” How can that be true if the choosing in Christ happened in eternity past?

Number two: Paul will later say in Ephesians 2 that he and the Ephesians were “Children under wrath as others were also.” And that the Ephesians, before they were believers, were without Christ. But how can that be if they were sealed by the grace of God before they were born? 

Number three: Paul wrote in Romans 8, “There is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.” But Jesus said, “Anyone who does not believe is condemned.” So, if Calvinistic doctrine is to be believed, a person who is chosen from eternity past but not yet a believer is simultaneously condemned and not condemned.^[18]

So, what did God predestine and what did He choose? He determined beforehand that anyone who was in Christ would not only be saved from death and judgment, but that they would be adopted as sons into the family of God and would be holy and blameless to the praise of His glory.

We see election exampled through Israel the “chosen” nation. Calvinist doctrine presents election as by-passing and excluding outsiders.^[19] What happened in Israel? What happened when Rahab wanted to join the chosen people? Was she excluded? What about Ruth? What about the mixed multitude of Exodus? What about the people of Gibeon? Were any of them excluded because they weren’t original members of the chosen seed of Abraham? No, they were all brought in and accepted when they came in faith. Even Naaman the Aramean was approved by God. He didn’t join Israel. He didn’t get circumcised. But his faith was accepted by God. 

Back to Rahab. Think of her story. She said, “please give me mercy.” The men of Israel did not say, “We’ve chosen the following specific members of your family to be saved.” They said, “Anyone who is in your house when judgment comes will be saved. The choice is yours and theirs.”

God chose that all who are in Christ will be saved and adopted. So, how can a person be in Christ? By faith. Acts 16: Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved. Romans 10: If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. What the New Testament explains is that, From that initial belief your understanding and obedience and love for God will grow. You will mature in your faith. Jesus said in John 14,

John 14:20-21 – ²⁰ …you will know that I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you. ²¹ The one who has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. And the one who loves me will be loved by my Father. I also will love him and will reveal myself to him.” 

In John 17, Jesus said that those who believe in Him through the word of His disciples are one in the Father and the Son. But that doesn’t mean a person has to know and do all kinds of things before they are placed in Christ. Simple, thief-on-the-cross faith is sufficient to be placed in Christ and then, from there, we are transformed in heart, mind, plan, purpose, and future by the power of God’s salvation.

Paul is saying that God determined to save the lost from before the foundation of the earth. It wasn’t a strategy session, this work of salvation emanates from Who God is.^[20] His nature is to save and to reconcile. To be clear, we don’t believe that faith saves a person. God’s grace – His work of redemption – is what saves. Through faith we lay hold of the salvation that God has accomplished and now offered freely to us. It’s His work, not ours. Our faith doesn’t save us, it simply is the mechanism by which we receive God’s free gift of salvation. 

Beyond the controversy, we can see that this amazing, gracious, saving election gives us not only many blessings, but also responsibility. It’s a calling. Paul says that God “chose us to be holy and blameless in love before Him. He predestined us to be adopted as sons through Jesus Christ for himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of His glorious grace.”

In these verses, there are four aspects to our calling now that we’re in Christ. We are holy, blameless, adopted children, to the praise of God’s glory.

We talked about holiness last time. It means we’re called to be separated, dedicated to spiritual purposes, and continually cleaned. 

Blameless means without blemish.^[21] Paul used a word that the Septuagint uses to refer to a sacrificial animal.^[22] Now, God is the One Who accomplishes our cleansing and sanctification. He began the work, He will complete it. He is the Author and Finisher of our faith. But, as the Bible reveals, we have a freed will and we are able to cooperate or resist the work that God is doing in our lives. In Romans 12, Paul said, “I urge you [brothers and sisters] to present your bodies as a living sacrifice.” On a Spiritual level we have the choice to be like Isaac, who willingly submitted to the sacrificial calling from his father. As we cooperate in this work of unblemishing, God is able to transform us and renew our minds and we are able to discern the will of God. 

Next, our calling is to be adopted as sons through Christ Jesus. And what a key facet this is. God’s desire is that we have the kind of relationship with Him that Jesus has with Him.^[23] That closeness. That affection. A tender, personal relation. God blesses us, we bless Him. God loved us first, we love Him back. God pours out His grace to us, we pour out our lives to Him. 

Next, our calling is to be part of the praise of God’s glorious grace. One of the great purposes of your life is to bring praise to the glory of God. Paul is demonstrating that the more we know about God, the more we realize what He’s done, the more worship and thankfulness will explode from our hearts. It’s like combining vinegar and baking soda. The reaction is going to happen. 

Robert Dale writes, “God should be great to the imagination, filling it with splendor; great to the intellect, commanding its most reverent homage and raising it to its loftiest activity; great to the heart, inspiring it with passionate affection, with perfect trust, with deep gratitude, with glorious hope, and with the awe which will restrain from sin.”^[24]

If we understand salvation, the result will be praise. Back in 2007 when the iPhone was announced, Steve Ballmer, then CEO of Microsoft, said there was “no chance” it would get any market share.^[25] He didn’t understand what it was. He didn’t understand that this device was going to change the world. Had he understood, it would not only have changed what he said, it would’ve changed the choices he and his company would make as a result. 

Paul will explain to the Ephesians that, as we live out our calling, we discover His desires for our lives. He’s prepared works ahead of us time for us to do and we are able to discern those things and accomplish them in God’s power and in the grace that He has given to each one of us.

Paul’s song encourages us to celebrate our God and His salvation. Through God’s grace we experience thousands upon thousands of blessings. And even though we live in a fallen world, even though we’re still waiting for the day when we’re fully, finally presented spotless, without sin or the desire to sin, the promises of God are already true right here, right now. R. Kent Hughes writes, “Temporarily we live here on earth; but spiritually we live in the heavenly realms where Christ lives. Paul calls us to immerse ourselves in this truth and to celebrate.”^[26]

Now, we need to think rightly about the blessings of God. The New Testament does not teach health and wealth for every believer. What does verse 3 say? God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavens. That doesn’t mean God never gives material blessings, but His blessings flow from His grace, His love, and His will for your life and for the Church. Some of those blessings are not things we would select from the blessing vending machine. Matthew 5: Blessed are those who are persecuted. 1 Peter 4: Blessed are those who are ridiculed for the name of Christ. In Revelation 2, martyrdom carries a special blessing from God.

Christian life is not a celebration of always being comfortable or profitable or successful. It is a celebration of that fact that the Living God is doing an eternal work with us. In verse 6, Paul says, “to the praise of His glorious grace that He lavished on us in the Beloved One.” Literally translated it is, “to the praise of His glorious grace, which He has begraced us with.”^[27] You are begraced by the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ.

And so, as we close this part of Paul’s beautiful song, we can consider. I’m not the Holy Spirit in your life, so I can’t tell you what sort of specific application you may need to make. But here are a couple of questions we can each ask ourselves based on how Paul has described the treasure trove^[28] of salvation and the consequences of laying hold of it. 

First, how do I think of God? Is He the God of personal, passionate, generous grace and kindness that Paul is presenting? Is He a Father in my life? Is He great in my mind? Is He King in my heart?

Second, am I person who brings praise to God’s glory? Is there a flow of worship and thankfulness and excitement about Who God is and what He’s done?

Third, is my life producing the predestined fruits of holiness, blamelessness, and adoption that God intends to bring out of my walk with Him? 

Fourth, am I remaining in Christ? In John 15 Jesus had those words for us: Remain in Me so that we can bear fruit and be glorified and progress in our discipleship. It’s been God’s plan all along, we want to take up the treasures and the responsibilities of such a great salvation.

Ephesians 1:1-2 – The Plan All Along

In some ways, being a Christian in Ephesus was a little like being a crewman on the USS Dallas in The Hunt For Red October. A diverse group of individuals, you live life together, sailing in difficult and sometimes hostile waters. It’s a demanding life, but you’re all in. One day a mysterious but authoritative man drops in to stay awhile and give you a new course, a new mission, and a new way of thinking about things. You don’t have that much visibility ahead, but you continue on. Occasionally, after long periods of waiting, the dot-matrix printer brings a message from topside: Here’s what you need to know, here’s your heading, now carry out your mission together. 

The city of Ephesus was centuries old, but Christianity had been in town fewer than 10 years. It’s between 60 and 62 AD.^[1] About five years earlier, Paul left the city after founding and leading the church there for 2 or 3 years. The crucifixion itself had only happened about 30 years before the Ephesians read their epistle. This was a harbor city on the western coast of modern Türkiye.^[2] It sat over 600 miles from Jerusalem, more than 800 miles from Rome, 500 miles from Antioch. It boasted a population of 250,000,^[3] making it the third largest city in the Roman Empire.^[4] 

Its strategic location made Ephesus an ideal connecter between East and West. Commerce flowed through her ports, bringing a variety of peoples, cultures, religions, and wealth. In the first century, the city constructed a marble road that led from the great theater where the Biblical riot took place to the Temple of Artemis, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.^[5] This temple was four times the size of the Greek Parthenon, making it the largest structure on earth at the time.^[6]

Ephesus was one of the world’s first tourist destinations and boasted many luxuries. The city streets were lit by oil lamps at night. The homes of the wealthy even featured running water and plumbing for their private bathrooms.^[7] If you weren’t rich enough for your own, you would use the newly constructed public bathroom which had its own plumbing system with running water. You can still visit it today and (I’m told) even sit on one of the seats. 

The city was full of wealth and wonders and amenities, but we know it was also full of paganism, racism, demonic activity, and unrest. Walking from home to work you would pass by brothels and occult shops, fortunetellers, demon possessed people and exorcists doing their best to help them.

Five or ten percent of the city’s population was Jewish.^[8] And a few of them had left the synagogue and formed a new community called a church. They followed “the way,” and some Gentiles had joined up, too. In fact, over the last 5 or 7 years, more Gentiles had been born again and were now Christian instead of worshippers of Diana or the Emperor cult or one of the Hero cults in town.

But what did it really mean to be a Christian in Ephesus? To come out of one of the Gentile religions would mean you were turning away from many things that defined your life: The style of worship. The accepted morals. The habits and pastimes. The social calendar. This was a whole new life, a whole new mentality, a whole new everything. But what new would be replacing the old?

We can’t imagine a world without Christianity. The Bible has been the best-selling book since 1522!^[9] But in first-century Ephesus, there was no New Testament. Jews in town would be familiar with the Hebrew Bible, but it’s not like Gentiles would have a copy in their home. In fact, the believers in Ephesus hadn’t even known about the existence of the Holy Spirit until Paul came and explained it to them a few years earlier! There are no Christian schools or publishing houses. There are no weekend seminars or retreats. Most of the Christians around you have also only been saved a few years. Paul got the church started and on a great track, but he’s been gone for 5 years and many of the Gentile church members had never met him, never heard him speak. In fact, they only knew the apostles’ doctrine secondhand. Meanwhile, as an Ephesian, you are inundated with philosophies and religions and claims about what is true and what the meaning of life is and what morality is and what is right and wrong. On top of that, there were powerful groups in your city who were convinced that the Christians were ruining the economy and destroying the fabric of society. And, quite honestly, you don’t actually know that much about what it means to be a Christian! You know you were blind and now you see – you know that you were a slave to sin and now you’re free in Christ, but beyond that, you have a lot of questions. 

It would’ve been hard to not feel isolated or wonder what Christian life was supposed to be. There was so much to have to figure out and navigate and, comparatively, so little to go on. 

Into that setting, Paul sent his letter to the Ephesians. And, we’ll see that it is particularly directed to those Gentile Christians who he did not know. Paul knew a lot of the Christians in Ephesus – he had spent 3 years there, doing ministry every single day. But this letter is primarily targeted toward those Gentile Christians who were new to the faith. And, there’s lots of good evidence that it wasn’t just for them, but was meant to be read in a bunch of churches throughout the region.^[10]

The letter Paul sent was a doozy. Here’s how scholars describe it: “Pound for pound, Ephesians may well be the most influential document ever written.”^[11]

It’s called, “The crown and climax of Pauline theology…the sublimest communication ever made to men.” ^[12]

At the same time, we will find that it is the most general Epistle written by Paul.^[13] It has no personal greetings. It speaks to no locally specific problems, like his letters to Corinth or Thessalonica did. But the fact that Ephesians is a general letter to a general audience shouldn’t make us focus less on it. The opposite is true. 

When we’re reading the letter to the Corinthians, we don’t really identify with some of the problems they had. When reading Galatians, we listen to the principles about not drifting into legalism, but, as a church, we’re not really in danger of taking on the Jewish rituals. But Ephesians speaks to us from start to finish about base level Christianity. What does it mean to be a Christian? What is the Christian life about? Whether you’re Jew or Gentile, rich or poor, ancient or modern, young or old, this is Christianity. It’s direct and specific and definitive. 

Of course, a book this important will be dogged by controversy. Starting in the late 1800’s, there have been some who suggest that Ephesians wasn’t written by Paul and it wasn’t written to the Ephesians.^[14] They say it was someone else using Paul’s name. If you read commentaries or blogs about Ephesians, you’re going to come across this argument. 

We can dispatch this idea very quickly. First, the text says it’s from Paul. There were writings that circulated claiming to be written by apostles but were, in fact, forgeries. Paul did not condone this practice, and the early church rejected these “pseudepigraphal” documents.^[15] “The witness of the early church for…Ephesians [being] a letter from Paul is extensive.” We don’t need to worry that the book is lying to us about who the author is.^[16]

Verse 1 of chapter 1 opens this way:

Ephesians 1:1a – Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by God’s will:

Paul wrote this letter while imprisoned and in chains. He was locked up a lot, so we can’t be sure which imprisonment it was, but the clues seem to indicate it was during his first Roman imprisonment when he was under house arrest for two years.^[17] 

He opens the letter speaking not as the guy who founded their church or their spiritual father or even as their old friend, but as a specially chosen messenger from God Himself. That’s what the term “apostle” means – a messenger sent on a mission.^[18] In chapter two he’s going to explain that the Church, universal, is being built on the foundation of the Apostles’ teaching because they had been specially commissioned by Jesus Christ to do this work. 

God’s will for Paul was for him to reveal the plan for the church. What Paul would explain would be mind-blowing, world-changing. Some of it mysterious, some of it demanding, some of it downright radical, but this is the plan the Lord has had all along. From before the formation of the cosmos, God has been accomplishing His plan. And Paul was going to explain to the Ephesians and to us what it means for us and what our part to play in that plan is. God’s will is that we discover it and join with Him in it. 

Verse 1 continues:

Ephesians 1:1b – To the faithful saints in Christ Jesus at Ephesus.

There are those who say the letter was not really to the Ephesians because there are three very old manuscripts that do not contain the words “at Ephesus.” Ok, that is true, but even those manuscripts have superscriptions identifying the letter as “to the Ephesians.”^[19]

Paul calls them “faithful saints.” For me, terms like these are easy to run by, but let’s pause on them.

In the Bible, every Christian is a saint. We don’t really use the word that way today because it’s one of those words that has been taken hostage. One commentator said, “Saints…[has been] restricted for centuries to men whose holiness has been of a very technical and artificial type.”^[20]

The term “saints” just means “holy ones.” You’re not holy because of religious things you do. You’re holy because of God’s work in your life. To be holy means you are separated, you are given a special, spiritual purpose, and you are clean. That’s holiness. And that’s the ongoing work of sanctification in a Christian life. We are continually separated from the pursuits and ruin of the world around us. We are given a spiritual purpose, much of which is described in this letter, and then we are continually made clean by the blood of the Lamb and the washing of the Word. That’s what it means to be a saint. If you’re a Christian, that’s you! 

Paul also calls them “faithful.” Does that mean I am full of faith or that I have a fidelity toward God? Yes! It means to be a person who is exercising your faith.^[21] It means the Ephesians believed in what they believed. What did they believe? That God revealed Himself through Jesus Christ, Who came and lived and died and rose again so that men could be saved from sin and given everlasting life. They believed that “the present age may end very soon, so one should be prepared for it.”^[22] They believed that the world around them was something to separate from and save others out of. They believed the Christian life was to be lived on purpose in the power of the Spirit. 

One source describes faithful sainthood during the first century this way: “Christians stood out for their chastity, their hatred of cruelty, their civil obedience, good citizenship and payment of taxes (despite the severe suspicion they incurred on this count because they refused to perform the customary civil formality of praying to the emperor and the state gods). They did not expose infants; they did not swear. They refused to have anything to do with idolatry and its by-products.”^[23]

Faithful saints. Such a simple descriptor, but incredibly important. Martyn Lloyd-Jones writes, “We find ourselves confronted here, by what the New Testament teaches is the basic irreducible minimum of what constitutes a Christian.”^[24] Faithful saints. Holy people exercising their beliefs.

Of course, the Ephesians weren’t perfect. We know that from Revelation 2. They would struggle and misstep – they would need adjustment and correction. But they were faithful saints. Of course, it’s obvious that they couldn’t say, “Well, we’re saved, so we know everything we need to know, now we just ride life out until we get to heaven.” The whole point of this letter is that Paul needed to explain truth to them and deepen their understanding. They needed this epistle. So do we.

Lloyd-Jones continues: “This is not a letter addressed to some unusual and exceptional Christians people…it is not a letter addressed to so-called scholars…it is not a letter to specialists, but a letter to ordinary church members…[It] is an epistle that is addressed to people like ourselves.”^[25]

Ephesians 1:2 – ² Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

What was God offering? The religions and philosophies of the culture around them offered all sorts of things. Earthly pleasures. The promise of bumper crops and fertility. Position in the empire. What did the Lord offer His people? Grace and peace. 

Of course, what God was extending is going to be detailed in fantastic depth in the coming verses. But overall it was grace and peace. Scholars point out that Paul Christianized versions of the Greek and Hebrew salutations here.^[26] It’s fitting because one of the great themes of Ephesians is going to be the unity of the Church – how God brings together Jews and Gentiles into one, growing unit.

Unity was such an important thing for the young church. It still is, but again, we should try to think about what it would’ve been like to be a Christian in Ephesus. We live in a time where it’s very easy to be disconnected from the church and still feel like we’re in fellowship with God’s people. In some ways, we’re really not that worried about unity because there isn’t such a difference between Christian culture and the world culture around us. But church community was so essential, so crucial, that the believers in a city like Ephesus would carve symbols into the rock on the ground as a sign to other Christians who might be looking for them. Perhaps you’ve heard the term “Ichthus.” Christians would carve IXOYE, an acronym that stood for “Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior” so that others would know where the church could be found. In Ephesus you can still see some of these carvings. They used the Ichthus Wheel. It was a circle with 8 spokes and with it you can see all the letters of IXOYE.^[27]

I don’t know what sort of vandalism laws were on the books, but imagine church fellowship and unity being so important that you took a hammer and chisel with you out into public so you could carve a special symbol into the concrete so you could gather with Christians you’ve never met!

The Lord is going to show us so much through Paul’s letter. It’s not just about unity, but also how God’s great desire is that you and I be filled full. Filled with the Spirit. Full of strength. Full of understanding. Full of purpose. Full of hope and the riches of God’s glory. Filled with all the fullness of God. This has been God’s plan and desire all along and His hope is that we would walk with Him in faith and obedience. Along all the days of our lives, His plan is to build us as individuals and as families and as a local church and as part of the universal church. His plan all along is to do this dramatic work in our lives “so that in the coming ages he might display the immeasurable riches of his grace through his kindness to us in Christ Jesus!”^[28]

Can you imagine that? You and me on display as the great example of God’s grace. Some of you have been to the Smithsonian. Think of what is on display there. God says He wants to put you on display for all eternity to demonstrate the immeasurable richness of His grace and kindness. The props from Red October aren’t on display at the Smithsonian as far as I know, but the Apollo 11 Command Module is. Why? Because it is a marvel of a great mission. Worthy of exhibit. The real thing.

Ephesians explains the marvelous mission and blessing of Christianity. But, this incredible plan is demanding. One commentator writes, “This letter requires us to change our inner being and character in a radical way. Life can no longer merely happen, for all our activity must now take place in, to, and for the Lord.”^[29] Darrell Bock writes, “This letter [serves] as an exhortation to…the church about what salvation is and what to do with that salvation as a result. It examines where the church as a community should be headed, with a crucial reminder that God in His grace has already given them all they need to get there.”^[30]

Along the way we’ll see that God’s truth directly challenges the philosophical systems of the world. It was Christ on the throne, not Caesar. Yahweh is our Father and God, not Artemis, who was called the “Queen of Heaven and described as the Lady-Lord and Savior.” Ephesus was proud to have been designed according to the principles of the great, Greek urban planner Hippodamus, but Paul would explain how a life, a home, a church, a society should be built based on the principles of Christ’s love and truth. While the leaders of Ephesus kept rebuilding and beautifying the great temple of Diana, Paul would explain that we are God’s Temple. While pagans downtown worshiped in Hero Cults, this letter would reveal to the Ephesian Christians that they were the heroes, called to put on armor and join in the triumphant fight against the powers of evil. 

This is the plan – this and much more. It’s always been the plan. The question is: Are we ready to hear what God’s plan is and then accept it for our lives? Are we on His course? Are we clinging to some city concern or have we stepped into the cosmic inheritance God has prepared for us? We are Christian which means we are going somewhere and we’re meant to go together. This book leads the way, in every age, through every circumstance, around every turn.

Footnotes[+]

Footnotes

↑1	Frank Thielman   Ephesians
↑2	In 2022, the Turkish government requested that the United Nations adopt the new version of the country’s name.
↑3	Gary Gromacki   The Spiritual War For Ephesus
↑4	B. M. Metzger, St. Paul and the Magicians
↑5	https://ephesus.us/ancient-ephesus/marble-road/
↑6	Darrell Bock   Ephesians
↑7	Adrian Brijbassi   Even in Ruins, Ephesus and Its Achievements Remain a Wonder
↑8, ↑17, ↑30	Bock
↑9	https://textandcanon.org/the-day-the-bible-became-a-bestseller/
↑10	The NET Bible First Edition Notes
↑11	Klyne Snodgrass   Ephesians
↑12	John Mackay   God’s Order: The Ephesian Letter And This Present Time
↑13	Thielman
↑14	Stephen Fowl   Ephesians: A Commentary
↑15, ↑25	ibid.
↑16	For detailed refutation of authorship challenges, see Klyne Snodgrass   Ephesians,   Darrell Bock   Ephesians
↑18	NASB Dictionaries
↑19, ↑22	Fowl
↑20	R.W. Dale   The Epistle To The Ephesians
↑21	Martyn Lloyd-Jones   God’s Ultimate Purpose: Ephesians 1
↑23	Michael Green   Evangelism In The Early Church
↑24	Lloyd-Jones
↑26	John Stott   The Message Of Ephesians
↑27	https://rcainboys.wordpress.com/2014/08/04/ichthus-wheel-early-christian-symbols/
↑28	Ephesians 2:7
↑29	Snodgrass