I was asked the other day if I would email a verse by verse explanation of Ephesians 2. The primary concern was verse 8, but I gave the context working up to and through the context of 8. The question was for a clarification of a brief explanation in our Sunday Night Class "What is the Gospel?" -Session #1, which is available through Word and Truth Media and from our church sermonaudio page linked below.
Here is my response.
I think it would be easiest to do this by having the Scripture and then commenting below, so that you see exactly where my comments are coming from as I do my best simply to state what the text is stating...
2 And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, 2 in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. 3 Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.
This speaks of the former state of these believers, the Ephesian Church, and speaks in contrast to those who are currently unbelievers. Their state (unbelievers) because of the sin of Adam bringing about their "deadness." They walk according to Satanic ways (prince of the power of the air), because they are "sons of disobedience." Scripture's use of the Phrase "son of" was understood and is understood as the embodiment of the character and attributes of that which you are the "son of." E.g. James and John are "sons of thunder," embodying thunder like characteristics. Judas the "son of perdition," - embodiment of sin. Barnabus, the "son of encouragement" to describe his personality and of course Jesus is Son of God, Son of Man, Son of David, Embodying the character and attributes of Deity, perfect humanity (he is the second adam), and David, the Messianic, Davidic, King.
The text goes on to say what our practices were, and even our nature was, when we were without salvation. "lust of flesh...desires of flesh and mind...by nature children of wrath." --traits carried by all born in sin.
4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),
In contrast to who we were is placed God and his attributes and his actions towards us. While we were dead (this is speaking of our spiritual deadness and inability to move towards God because of our nature)...While we were dead, GOD "made us alive together with Christ." Spiritually we were dead. spiritually dead men don't do anything in the realm of spiritual life, because they are dead. Think of a corpse in a casket at a funeral. The corpse can do nothing in the realm of the spiritual living. Dead men don't make choices and they certainly don't make good ones (as confirmed with all the other passages about inability we covered Sunday). Instead, God “made us alive together with Christ.” It was a work of God alone, the dead play no part in giving life to itself.
Verse 5 interjects with a phrase which will be used again below with expansion. "by grace you have been saved" -- grace, as you know, is a free gift, an undeserved gift, an unearned gift, an unmerited favor - gift.
6 and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
Keeping comments minimal hear, because they aren't the focus of what I taught, nor what you are interested in. Paul speaks now of our current spiritual reality. We are raised, seated with Him, he will show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness towards us. Speaking of the testament to how good He was to us who were "children of wrath." And the ultimate show of that will be in the completion of our salvation in glorification at the rapture. We will have been brought from embodying (son of) the character and attributes of wrath, to being the embodiment of the character and attributes of righteousness (children of righteousness).
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.
Here again is our Phrase. "For by grace you have been saved" --again an unmerited, undeserved, free gift, but this time an additional phrase is added "through faith." Here is where the natural response would be, "oh, I had to do something. I had to have faith." Even though that seems contradictory to the "unmerited, undeserved, free gift," idea of grace. And so Paul clarified after the semi-colon. In fact he clarified three times and then gave the logical result of the proper understanding. Here it is...1. "and that not of yourself, 2. it is the gift of God, 3. not as a result of works, and the result "so that no one may boast.
1. and that not of yourself -- "that" is in the neuter gender in greek. typically a demonstrative, "that," will be in agreement in gender with the referent if anything but the closest possible referent is meant. Here the neuter of "that," doesn't match anything in the context and so it is a referent to either the whole act of salvation including grace and faith that brings about salvation that isn't of yourself (which would be true), or "faith," the closest referent, which is the most exegetically sound option since these phrases are used to clarify the addition “through faith” to a phrase already used in the verses above. And so "faith" "is not of yourselves". This again is clarified in the second phrase.
2. "it is the gift of God" --the problem as you will recall is that when Pual added "through faith," the immediate reaction is "oh, I do have a part to play before I can receive grace, namely, I have to have faith." Here he clarifies, that "faith" was a gift. Something God gave. I might add, an unearned, unmerited, undeserved, free gift of God. We were dead spiritually and children of wrath, following our nature as sons of disobedience, how could we have earned the gift, plus Paul in Romans says, grace that is earned is no longer grace, it is wages. A gift that is earned is no longer a gift, it is a paycheck. But he goes on with one more clarification.
3. not as a result of works" -- literally "ouk ex ergon" - "not from works" - again just to recall the argument. "through faith" made the reader say, "oh I have a part i need to play first, in order to receive salvation. I must have faith to receive grace." then the clarifications: no the faith is not of yourself. the faith is a gift from God. and here, the faith is not from works. In other words, it isn't something that we do in order to merit, or deserve, or earn the application of grace. That would effectively nullify grace (unearned, unmerited, undeserved). Grace earned is wages (Rom 4:4). And also it would be an impossibility to have that faith in the state of our deadness, and wrathfulness, etc. or as Romans 8 said, while of the mind of the flesh and unable to do the things of the spirit of God, unable to please God, at enmity with God, as you will recall from our study Sunday. And so the faith is “not from works,” not something we do of our own accord to play a part before being able to receive 1. grace, 2. salvation.
Then finally the result of this line of thinking.
"so that no one may boast" -- if the faith was of yourself, not a gift of God, and was a work that we did in order to receive salvation (I won't say grace at this point, because it no longer would be unmerited favor), then we would be able to boast. e.g. I'm saved, because I had faith. that guy isn't saved, because he wasn't sensitive enough, smart enough, spiritually minded enough, etc. But if even the faith necessary to call on the name of the Lord is something that is given to us, then we are left with no room to boast. e.g. Why are you saved and not that guy? I have no idea. God chose to give me grace and faith to respond when I didn't deserve it, to the praise of His glory ALONE!
10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
Then to cap it all off, Paul writes an explanatory sentence, starting with the explanatory “gar” in Greek. When we see that “gar,” we expect the summary. And that is what we get. “We are His workmanship.” All that we are and all that we have become as “Saved ones” is something He has done, not by our works, the faith was not of ourselves, it was His gift, leaving us no room to boast except in the Lord as 1 Cor 1. says “let he who boasts boast in the Lord.” He, in his workmanship, made us who we are, created in Christ Jesus for good works. He made us who we are, gave us faith by his grace, brought us into salvation so that we can be created anew. We were dead, children of wrath, following after our lusts, sons of disobedience, etc, but he made us new to do good works, which he prepared before hand so that we would walk in them, not in the sins of our former lives.
And of course I won’t go into how this pairs right with the other passages we covered. No one can come unless drawn, granted by the father in John 6. The mind of the flesh can’t do that which pleases God, can’t obey the law of God, is unable, in Rom. 8. The natural man does not comprehend the things of the spirit, only the one who is given the spirit can understand spiritual things (1 Cor 2.), etc. But all that is available to review on the handout, or if you would like to hear it again it is on our sermonaudiopage. www.sermonaudio.com/Centralbible
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