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Ephesians - 2
Ephesians 2:1-10
Introduction
When a professional sports team wins their respective national championship, each player receives an award of some kind.
For the NFL the players receive the Super Bowl ring.
For the MLB the players receive their World Series rings.
The unique aspect of how these teams hand out these rings is that it is not only the players and coaches who receive them.
Every single person who works for the organization in any capacity receives the same ring.
It makes sense for the players and coaches to receive them.
They are the ones who have worked so hard to earn it.
They put in the countless hours of workouts.
They trained during the off-season.
They endured grueling practices.
They put in the time on the field and conquered the opposing teams to become the best team in the world for that season.
Yet, once they win, even the janitors get a ring.
The guy who washes the sweat towels gets a ring.
Those who did not put in the work get the same prize.
Those who do not necessarily deserve the reward receive equal status as champion.
This is an apt description of the manner in which God saves His people.
Believers have put in no work.
They have not earned any reward from the Lord.
They do not deserve any benefit from Him.
Yet, God’s people receive the fullness of salvation from Him anyway.
He did all the work.
He fully accomplished everything necessary to save.
And then, out of His grace, He grants the full benefits and privileges to His undeserving people.
This is the message of Ephesians 2:1-10.
If, as we said last week, that Ephesians 1:3-14 is the blueprint for salvation, then Ephesians 2:1-10 is the detailed to-do list of how the work of salvation is actually accomplished.
The clear emphasis of the text is that God accomplishes the work of salvation without human merit or human input, but works solely through the agency of Jesus Christ.
And just as chapter 1 displayed the reality of Union with Christ as the means by which God accomplishes salvation, that same emphasis is continued here.
So much so, that the glory of salvation can be defined by the relationship believers have ‘in Christ.’
It is the reality of salvation itself.
To be ‘in Christ’ is to be saved.
Ephesians 2:1-10 - And you were dead in your transgressions and sins,
2 in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience,
3 among whom we all also formerly conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.
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—
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.
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;
9 not of works, so that no one may boast.
10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
This text is a series of dramatic contrasts.
He first identifies the bad news that made salvation necessary, and then the good news that God has accomplished salvation.
A Christian’s previous condition outside of Christ is described as ‘dead’ but is now contrasted with their having been ‘made alive.’
Their past reality of being under the lordship of Satan is set opposed to now being seated with Christ in the heavenly realms.
God’s wrath is set in contrast to His mercy, love, grace, and kindness.
Those outside of Christ and those ‘in Christ’ could not be in more starkly opposite realities.
THE BAD NEWS (V.
1-3)
As Paul begins with the bad news, we have to admit that the bad news is worse than we could ever imagine.
He opens verse 1 with ‘you were dead in your transgressions and sins.’
Spiritual death is not some vague, mystical theory, but a real condition that real people experience.
Last week chapter 1 established that God is the sole initiator of salvation.
And that can be challenging to understand and accept.
Though it appears we have chosen God and have come to Him on our own, here we see why that is absolutely false.
This is why God has to be the initiator, working behind the scenes…you are spiritually dead.
Do you know what dead people do?
Nothing!
They don’t seek after God.
They don’t explore answers to questions.
They don’t make decisions.
They’re just there.
Dead as can be.
Author Jared Wilson writes that we mistakenly view salvation like we are out at sea and our boat sinks.
There we are floating in the water, struggling with all our might to stay alive, and Jesus comes along with a rescue boat and throws us the life raft and we grab it and are rescued.
The problem with that is that is not at all the picture the NT gives us regarding our salvation.
We are not struggling with all our might to keep our head above water and reaching out for a life boat.
We are a corpse bobbing up and down in the water.
We don’t need rescue.
We need resurrection.
Don’t miss the critical importance of this.
Outside of Christ you are not lost and struggling.
You are dead.
In your sin, separated from the Giver of Life.
For the next couple of verses, Paul explains how this came to be.
There are three enemies of your soul that have all combined to execute you.
But first, he inserts a word of hope…v. 2 - in which you formerly walked.
You used to be this way.
You used to be dead in your sin.
That ought to perk up our ears.
So outside of Christ we are spiritually dead, but apparently it doesn’t have to be that way.
There can be victory over those deadly spiritual enemies.
The first enemy is the world.
They ‘walked’ (metaphor for lifestyle) v. 2 - according to the course of this world.
‘According to’ or in line with, influenced by, the world.
The pattern of our world is in direct opposition to God.
1 John 2:15-16 - 15 Do not love the world nor the things in the world.
If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.
This is why we aren’t to love the world, meaning the sinful practices and attitudes of the world.
It is in rebellion against God.
The world doesn’t love God.
The world doesn’t seek after God’s will.
The world doesn’t honor God.
At best, He is an afterthought, but more likely not thought about at all.
That is the air we breathe.
And it infects everything about us.
How easy it is to simply conform and go right along with the world around us.
And doing so, Paul says, will kill you.
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