Ephesians 1.18c-The Father's Inheritance is the Church Age Believer
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Tuesday June 20, 2023
Ephesians Series: Ephesians 1:18c-The Father’s Inheritance is the Church Age Believer
Lesson # 58
Ephesians 1:15 For this reason, after I myself heard about the faith among each and every one of you in the one and only Lord Jesus as well as you are practicing divine-love, which is on behalf of each and every one of the saints, 16 I never permit myself to cease regularly expressing thanks to the one and only God because of each and every one of you. I do this while disciplining myself to make it my practice of remembering each and every one of you during my prayers. 17 I make it a habit of occupying myself with praying that the God, that is, the glorious Father of the one and only Lord ruling over each and every one of us as a corporate unit, who is Jesus Christ, would cause each and every one of you to receive divine wisdom, specifically, divine revelatory wisdom provided by the one and only Spirit with respect to an experiential knowledge of Himself. 18 Namely, that the eyes of your heart are enlightened in order that each and every one of you would possess the conviction of what constitutes being the confident expectation of blessing produced by His effectual call, what constitutes His inheritance, which is characterized by glorious wealth, residing in the person of the saints. (Lecturer’s translation)
Ephesians 1:18 continues Paul’s thought from Ephesians 1:15-17 and in particular from 1:17 since it not only presents the purpose of Paul’s prayer for the recipients of the Ephesian epistle in Ephesians 1:17 but also explains what is meant by the prayer request in this verse.
The second time Paul employs the interrogative pronoun tis (τις) in the infinitival purpose in verse 18 it is expressing the idea of the recipients of the Ephesian epistle possessing the conviction regarding “what constitutes” the glorious wealth of the Father’s inheritance which resides in the saints.
This word is the referent of the articular genitive feminine singular form of the noun klēronomia (κληρονομία), “inheritance.”
The latter we noted speaks of the church age believer being perfected in a resurrection body at the rapture of the church or being in the presence of the Lord at physical death as well as rewards for faithful service from the Lord Jesus Christ at the Bema Seat Evaluation of the church.
Thus, these future blessings are the referent of this interrogative pronoun.
The noun ploutos (πλοῦτος), “wealth” appeared in Ephesians 1:7 where it referred to God the Father’s “infinite” grace, which is directed to the church age believer through faith in Jesus Christ.
The word is thus referring to the infinite or unmeasurable unmerited spiritual benefits that were received by the church age believer as a result of their justification and union and identification with Jesus Christ.
Now, here in Ephesians 1:18, the word is used in a figurative sense to refer to a spiritual and material abundance of material and spiritual possessions and spiritual resources possessed by God the Father.
In other words, it is used figuratively of the spiritual and material prosperity of the Father.
Two of these spiritual blessings, which flow from the Father’s wealth are being alluded to here with this word.
Namely, the church age believer being in the presence of the Lord Jesus at physical death or being perfected in a resurrection body at the rapture of the church as well as receiving rewards for faithful service from the Lord Jesus Christ at the Bema Seat Evaluation of the church.
The noun doxa (δόξα), “glorious” functions as an attributive genitive and is expressing the idea that the Father’s wealth is glorious in the sense that it is marked by great beauty and splendor, which is also notably or brilliantly outstanding because of His great dignity and achievements or actions.
Therefore, this word is describing the church age believer being in the presence of the Lord Jesus at physical death or being perfected in a resurrection body at the rapture of the church as well as receiving rewards for faithful service from the Lord Jesus Christ at the Bema Seat Evaluation of the church as being glorious.
The noun klēronomia (κληρονομία), “inheritance” is two-fold: (1) The church age believer being in the presence of the Lord at physical death or in a resurrection body at the rapture of the church (2) The church age believer receiving rewards for faithful service at the Bema Seat Evaluation of the church, which immediately follows the resurrection or rapture of the church.
The articular construction of this noun is employed with the genitive masculine singular form of the intensive personal pronoun autos (αὐτός) to denote possession.
The referent of this word is God the Father.
Therefore, this construction indicates that this inheritance is the Father’s possession or in other words, church age believers are the Father’s inheritance.
The noun klēronomia functions as an attributed genitive, which functions semantically as the exact opposite of the attributive genitive, which means that the head noun rather than the genitive substantive is functioning as an attributive adjective.
In our present context, we noted that the head noun in a loose manner, which in our context is the noun ploutos (πλοῦτος), “wealth” and so therefore, we can convert this noun into the adjective “rich” since it is ascribing wealth to the Father’s inheritance.
The adjective hagios (ἅγιος), “the saints” functions as a substantive and describes all the members of the body of Christ who have been set apart through the baptism of the Spirit at the moment of justification in order to order serve God exclusively.
The articular construction is monadic indicating that Christians are a “unique” people on the earth.
They are unique because of their union and identification with Jesus Christ in His crucifixion, death, burial, resurrection and session at the right hand of God the Father.
They are also unique because they are members of the body of Christ (cf. 1 Cor. 12) and are members of the bride of Christ (Eph. 5:22-33).
The substantive use of the adjective hagios functions as the object of the preposition en (ἐν), which functions as a marker of location expressing the idea that the glorious wealth of the Father’s inheritance is “located in” the saints.
In other words, this inheritance resides in the saints themselves as the children of the Father.
So therefore, notice that this inheritance is “the Father’s” and not the church age believer’s inheritance.
This is the case because Paul asserts that the Father’s inheritance is located in the saints, i.e. church age believers who are in union with and identified with His Son, Jesus Christ.
This clearly indicates that the church age believer being in the presence of the Lord at physical death or in a resurrection body at the rapture of the church and receiving rewards for faithful service at the Bema Seat Evaluation of the church is the Father’s inheritance.
In other words, the Father benefits from the blessing the church age believer with a resurrection body and rewards for faithful service.
The church age believer in a resurrection body is perfected and will never sin again because they no longer possess a sin nature, which resided in the genetic structure which resided of their human body before their death or the rapture.
We can also see that the Father’s inheritance is tied to the church age believer’s inheritance since the Father’s inheritance is the church age believer in a resurrection body minus a sin nature and decorated with rewards for faithful service to Him, which constitutes the church age believer’s inheritance.
The Father also benefits or is glorified by bestowing these blessings on the believer because it manifests His holy character such as His love, omnipotence, omniscience, sovereignty righteous and justice.
He is glorified or benefits from bestowing these blessings on the believer because it was through the believer’s union and identification with His Son, Jesus Christ that they will receive these blessings.
They were guaranteed a resurrection body at the moment of their justification since the latter provided them a guarantee of a resurrection body.
This justifying faith appropriated the omnipotence of the Holy Spirit.
They will receive rewards for faithful service as a result of appropriating by faith after their justification their union and identification with Jesus Christ in His crucifixion, death, burial, resurrection and session at the Father’s right hand.
This post-justification faith appropriated the omnipotence of the Holy Spirit and which omnipotence enabled the believer to merit rewards at the Bema Seat for faithful service.
Therefore, the Father is glorified because His omnipotence was manifested through the Spirit empowering the believer to execute His will.
Interestingly, therefore, the Father is glorified and benefitted by giving the church age believer their inheritance, which is the resurrection body and rewards for faithful service.
This interpretation that Paul is speaking in Ephesians 1:18 of the church age believer being the Father’s inheritance rather than the church age believer’s inheritance is supported by the assertions Paul makes in both Ephesians 1:5 and 11.
In the former, Paul asserts that the Father elected the church age believer in eternity past by predestinating them for the purpose of adoption as His sons because of His love through Jesus Christ for Himself.
In the latter, he asserts that the church age believer is the Father’s possession.
Ephesians 1:5 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. (Lecturer’s translation)
Ephesians 1:11 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. (Lecturer’s translation)