Ephesians 2:1-3
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-Tell me something good, tell me something pleasant, we want the happy ending in a movie, we desire to hear the good news rather than the bad news, but we must hear the bad news to understand the good news
-chapter 1 - the eternal purpose of God in salvation
-Why did Paul bring up the sinful condition right after praising God for election, adoption through grace?
-It is only when we understand our pitiful state that we can rejoice in the saving grace of Jesus
-You - addresses directly, they are not the powerful Christ, but have benefited from the powerful Christ
-were - before Christ, before hearing the gospel and responding in faith
-In order to understand God’s grace and love we must understand our condition
There never was a man yet who was in a state of grace who did not know himself, in himself, to be in a state of ruin, a state of depravity and condemnation.
Charles Spurgeon
The first main heading of the doctrines of grace is total depravity, or radical depravity.
Dr. Steven J. Lawson
Death
Death
-dead = often used in Greek literature to describe someone who is spiritually deficient
-This is why Jesus said
7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’
-before we heard and responded to the gospel we were walking around as dead people, it means we had no desire for the things of God, no desire to know the maker of life
14 for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, “Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”
-death is the penalty for sin
17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned—
23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
-of course it is in reference to a physical death, but it is also about spiritual separation from God
-Good news Christ has brought us from death to life
4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
Slavery
Slavery
-once walked = to live
10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
-sin dominated their lives, it dominated our lives
-we followed the culture, we followed the tide of sin, unable to swim against it
34 Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.
21 And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds,
7 In these you too once walked, when you were living in them.
-enslaved to what? to disobedience
to follow the course of the world - rebellion against God
-enslaved to the ruler of darkness
-Good news Christ has set us free from the slavery of sin
6 We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.
All are Infected
All are Infected
-we all once lived
-flesh = human condition affected by sin
The biblical doctrine of ‘total depravity’ means neither that all humans are equally depraved nor that nobody is capable of any good, but rather that no part of any human person (mind, emotion, conscience, [and] will …) has remained untainted by the fall
22 the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction:
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
-How were we infected?
a. entirely - cravings of the flesh carried out by the body, thoughts
-desires of the flesh - desire for sin, rebellion
16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.
b. by nature children of wrath
-Why God’s wrath?
-God’s wrath is His reaction to evil, it is the reaction of holiness opposed to evil
-Isn’t God loving? Alistair Begg His love is the occasion of His wrath
-Do you ever get angry at injustice? Do you want a doctor who ignores the cancer in your body? Would we want God to be indifferent to sin?
-The wrath of God explains the love of God - God appeased His wrath with His very own Son
-We live in a society that is opposed to holiness, opposed to God
-To be clear total depravity does not mean a lost person cannot do good things, does that mean that it always looks like the most evil person of society
CS Lewis - In a well-lit office, there he sits: a nice man lost in his niceness.
-All of this sets up the understanding of v. 4 - But God, we were dead in sin but God made us alive together with Christ