Ephesians 1.14b-The Father Will Redeem the Church Age Believer at the Rapture
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Tuesday May 9, 2023
Ephesians Series: Ephesians 1:14b-The Father Will Redeem the Church Age Believer at the Rapture
Lesson # 46
Ephesians 1:3 The God, namely the Father of the Lord ruling over us, who is Jesus Christ, is worthy of praise. Namely, because He is the one who has blessed each and every one of us by means of each and every kind of Spirit appropriated blessing in the heavenlies in Christ. 4 For He chose each and every one of us for His own purpose because of Him alone before creation in order that each and every one of us would be holy as well as uncensurable in His judgment. 5 He did this by predestinating each and every one of us for the purpose of adoption as sons because of His love through Jesus Christ for Himself according to the pleasure of His will. 6 This was for the purpose of praising His glorious grace, which He freely bestowed on each and every one of us because of the one who is divinely loved. 7 Because of whom, each one of us are experiencing that which is the redemption through His blood, namely the forgiveness of our transgressions according to His infinite grace. 8 This He provided in abundance for the benefit of each and every one of us because of the exercise of a wisdom, which is absolute and divine in nature resulting in the manifestation of an insight, which is absolute and divine in nature. 9 He did this by revealing the mystery of His will for the benefit of each and every one of us according to His pleasure, which He planned beforehand because of our faith in and resultant union and identification with Himself. 10 This was for the dispensation which brings to completion the various periods of history. Namely, to unite for the benefit of Himself each and every animate and inanimate object in the sphere of the sovereign authority of the person of the one and only Christ. Specifically, to unite for the benefit of Himself those things in the heavens as well as those things on the earth in the sphere of the sovereign authority of Himself. 11 Because of whom, each and every one of us has been claimed as a possession because of having been predestinated according to the predetermined plan. Namely, the one who is causing each and every animate and inanimate object to function according to His purpose, that is, His sovereign will 12 in order that each and every one of us would belong to a particular group of people. Namely, those who are certain of possessing a confident expectation of blessing because of their faith in and union and identification with the one and only Christ for the purpose of praising His glory. 13 Correspondingly, because of whom, each and every one of you were sealed by means of the omnipotence of the one and only promised Spirit, who is holy because each and every one of you obeyed the one and only message, which is truth, namely, the proclamation of the one and only gospel, which produced your salvation. Specifically, because each one of you believed in Him. 14 The Spirit is the down payment of our inheritance until He redeems His possession for the praise of His glory. (Lecturer’s translation)
Ephesians 1:14 continues and completes Paul’s thought regarding the Holy Spirit which he began in Ephesians 1:13, because it is describing a ministry of the Holy Spirit during the church age which will continue until the rapture or resurrection of the church when the church age believer will receive their resurrection body.
This verse is composed of the following: (1) relative pronoun clause hos estin arrabōn tēs klēronomias hēmōn (ὅς ἐστιν ἀρραβὼν τῆς κληρονομίας ἡμῶν), “The Spirit is the down payment of our inheritance.” (2) prepositional phrase eis apolytrōsin tēs peripoiēseōs (εἰς ἀπολύτρωσιν τῆς περιποιήσεως), “until He redeems His possession.” (3) prepositional phrase eis epainon doxēs autou (εἰς ἔπαινον δόξης αὐτοῦ), “for the praise of His glory.”
Therefore, the apostle Paul is asserting in Ephesians 1:14 that the Holy Spirit is the down payment of the church age believer’s inheritance, which we will note, not only involves receiving a resurrection body at the rapture or resurrection of the church but also rewards for faithful service at the Bema Seat Evaluation of the church, which immediately follows the rapture, which is imminent.
He also asserts that the Spirit is down payment of the church age believer’s inheritance until the Father redeems His possession, which is the church and as we will also note, He will do this at the rapture or resurrection of the church.
Paul asserts that this is all for praise of the Father’s glory, and which glory was not only manifested through the work of the Son during His First Advent (Eph. 1:7-12) but also through the work of the Holy Spirit on behalf of the church age believer at their justification.
Now, here in Ephesians 1:14, we have an interpretative problem with regards to the prepositional phrase eis apolytrōsin tēs peripoiēseōs (εἰς ἀπολύτρωσιν τῆς περιποιήσεως), “until He redeems His possession” (Author’s translation).
The noun apolutrōsis is the object of the preposition eis (εἰς), which could be interpreted as a marker of marker of purpose, which would indicate that it is marking the purpose of the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit in the body of the church age believer being the down payment of their inheritance.
Therefore, this prepositional phrase eis apolytrōsin tēs peripoiēseōs (εἰς ἀπολύτρωσιν τῆς περιποιήσεως) indicates that the purpose of the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit in the body of the church age believer being the down payment of their inheritance is to redeem this possession, i.e. their inheritance.
However, it makes better sense to interpret the preposition eis as a temporal marker of a continuous extent of time up to a point.
Here the continuous extent of time is the church age and the point to which this period extends is the rapture or resurrection of the church when the church age believer receives their resurrection body.
Therefore, this would indicate that the word is marking the time or when the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit in the body of the church age believer will no longer be the down payment of the church age believer’s inheritance.
In other words, it is marking the time when they will receive this inheritance.
Therefore, this prepositional phrase eis apolytrōsin tēs peripoiēseōs (εἰς ἀπολύτρωσιν τῆς περιποιήσεως) indicates that the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit in the body of the church age believer is the down payment of the church age believer’s inheritance “until” the Father redeems this possession, i.e. the church age believer, at the rapture or resurrection of the church.
This interpretation is supported by the use of this preposition eis in Ephesians 4:30 where it is used in relation to the noun apolutrōsis.
In this verse, Paul prohibits the recipients of the Ephesian epistle to not grieve the Holy Spirit by whom they were sealed eis hēmeran apolytrōseōs (εἰς ἡμέραν ἀπολυτρώσεως), “until the day of redemption.”
Secondly, the term apolutrōsis, “redemption” in Ephesians 4:30 and 1:14 is different from the redemption mentioned in Ephesians 1:7, which defines this redemption as the forgiveness of sins and as having occurred in the past.
The day of redemption in Ephesians 4:30 is yet future and refers to the redemption of the church age believer’s body at the rapture of resurrection of the church when they receive their resurrection body.
The noun apolutrōsis, “redemption” is also used Romans 8:23 for the redemption of the church age believer’s body at the rapture or resurrection of the church.
The redemption here in Ephesians 1:14 is also future and is not used in relation to the forgiveness of sins as it was in Ephesians 1:7 but rather it is used of the redemption of the body when the church age believer receives their resurrection body at the rapture or resurrection of the church.
In Ephesians 1:17, the noun apolutrōsis (ἀπολύτρωσις), “redemption” is referring to the redemption of the soul of the church age believer.
Specifically, it speaks of the soul of the church age believer experiencing having been purchased out of the slave market of sin by the Lord Jesus Christ’s spiritual and physical deaths on the cross as their substitute.
Experiencing this redemption was the result of being declared justified by the Father through faith in His one and only Son, the Lord Jesus Christ and their union and identification with Him through the baptism of the Spirit at the moment of justication.
However, here in Ephesians 1:14, the noun apolutrōsis is used of the redemption of the body of the church age believer when they receive their resurrection body at the rapture or resurrection of the church, which is imminent.
Specifically, it speaks of the church age believer experiencing receiving a resurrection body at the rapture or resurrection of the church.
The redemption of the church age believer’s body at the rapture or resurrection of the church will be the completion of their salvation and sanctification.
The articular form of the noun peripoiēsis (περιποίησις), “this possession” pertains to the act of gaining possession of something and pertains to that which is acquired, presumably with considerable effort.
Here in Ephesians 1:14, the word speaks of the Father acquiring the church age believer as His own possession as a result of considerable effort, namely through the crucifixion, death, burial, resurrection and session of His Son.
This interpretation is supported by the fact that the first person plural aorist passive indicative conjugation of the verb klēroō (κληρόω), which appears in Ephesians 1:11, speaks of the church age believer being claimed by God as His own possession at the moment of their justification.