Ephesians 4.21-Paul Reminds Gentile Christian Community How They Learned About Christ Through Experience
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Tuesday August 19, 2025
Ephesians Series: Ephesians 4:21-Paul Reminds Gentile Christian Community How They Learned About the Christ Through Personal Experience
Lesson # 266
Ephesians 4:17 Therefore, at this particular time I am communicating, specifically, at this particular time I am solemnly and earnestly making a request on the basis of the Lord’s sovereign authority. Namely, that each and every one of you as a corporate unit continue to no longer make it your habit of conducting your lives as in fact the Gentiles are conducting their lives by means of the futility produced by their thinking. 18 Specifically, because they are darkened with respect to their understanding (of the three-fold revelation of the triune God). Consequently, they are alienated from the life, which originates uniquely in the character and nature of the one and only God because of the ignorance, which is a characteristic within them because of the hardness, which is produced by the function unique to their hearts. 19 Because they are characterized as insensitive (to God and His will and ways), each and every one of them as a corporate unit have given themselves over to self-indulgence for the purpose of practicing every type of sexual immorality in an inordinate and insatiable manner. 20 On the contrary, by no means whatsoever in this manner did each and every one of you as a corporate unit learn about the one and only Christ through experience. 21 If and let us assume for the sake of argument that each and every one of you as a corporate unit in fact conformed to an experiential knowledge of Him and we all agree each one of you did. In other words, each and every one of you as a corporate unit were taught about Him through personal experience because obedience to the truth corresponds to an experiential knowledge of Jesus. (Lecturer’s translation)
Ephesians 4:21 is a protasis of a first class condition, which indicates the assumption of truth for the sake of argument and the contents of Ephesians 4:22-24 explain the contents of Ephesians 4:21 and so therefore, the contents of Ephesians 4:21-24 constitute the protasis of this first class condition.
In Ephesians 4:22, Paul asserts that the recipients of this epistle were taught with reference to their pre-justification lifestyle to lay aside their indwelling old Adamic sin nature which is being corrupted in accordance its deceitful desires.
Then, in Ephesians 4:23, he taught them that they must do so in order to be renewed in the spirit of their mind.
Lastly, in Ephesians 4:24, Paul teaches the recipients of this epistle that they must lay aside the indwelling old Adamic sin nature and instead put on the new indwelling Christ nature which has been created in God’s image by means of righteousness and holiness that comes from obeying the truth.
Therefore, the contents of Ephesians 4:22-24 are describing the recipients living in their new indwelling Christ nature that every church age believer receives at the moment of justification through regeneration by the Holy Spirit.
This is accomplished by the church age believer experiencing their union and identification which also took place at the moment of justification through the baptism of the Spirit, which identifies them with Jesus Christ in His crucifixion, death, burial, resurrection and session at the right hand of the Father.
This interpretation is indicated by the fact that the church age believer received a new Christ nature and was placed in union and identified with Christ at the moment of justification and both were accomplished through the power of the Holy Spirit.
The new Christ nature is received through the Spirit’s ministry in regeneration while the believer’s union and identification with Christ is received through the Spirit’s work in baptism and thus, the believer lives in their new nature when they appropriate by faith their union and identification with Christ.
The apodosis of this first class condition appears in Ephesians 4:20 presents a contrast with the statements in Ephesians 4:17-19, which describe the ungodly mind-set and resultant ungodly lifestyle of unregenerate Gentile humanity.
In Ephesians 4:20, Paul emphatically asserts that the recipients of this epistle by no means whatsoever learned about the person of Christ through experience in the manner described in Ephesians 4:17-19, which describes the ungodly thinking and lifestyle unregenerate Gentile humanity.
When Paul speaks of these Gentile Christians learning about the person of Jesus Christ, he is speaking of learning about Christ in an experiential sense or in other words, they possessed an experiential knowledge of Jesus Christ by obeying Paul’s Spirit inspired teaching.
Thus, he is speaking of them learning through experience about the person of Christ and to experience the person of Christ is to live the Christian way of life.
Therefore, the contents of Ephesians 4:20 presents a contrast between the experience of these Gentile Christians in the Roman province of Asia and the experience of unregenerate Gentile humanity.
Specifically, it marks a contrast between these Gentile Christians learning about the person of Christ through their life experience with that of the life experience of unregenerate Gentile humanity.
The former is based upon obedience to Paul’s Spirit inspired teaching and results in a godly mindset and lifestyle, which results in pleasing God and doing His will.
The latter is based upon obedience to the sinful desires of the indwelling old Adamic sin nature and obeying the lies of Satan’s cosmic world system, which results in sin and rebellion against God.
In Ephesians 4:21, Paul employs the protasis of a first class condition as a tool of persuasion in that he uses it to persuade the recipients of this letter to come to his conclusion in the apodosis and this is also a responsive first class condition which indicates that the audience would totally agree with the assertion in the protasis.
Therefore, the protasis in Ephesians 4:21-24 is designed not only to persuade the recipients of this letter to this course of action but to remind them of it as well.
The idea of the protasis is “if and let assume that it is true for the sake argument that each and every one of you as a corporate unit conformed to an experiential knowledge of Christ or in other words, each and every one of you as a corporate unit were taught about Him through experience because obedience to the truth corresponds to an experiential knowledge of Jesus and we all agree each one of you did.”
The apodosis asserts that “by no means whatsoever in this manner did each and every one of you as a corporate unit learn about Christ through experience.”
Now, in Ephesians 4:21, when Paul speaks about Christ, he is speaking about the recipients of this epistle possessing an experiential knowledge of Him, which is indicated by the fact that the referent of the accusative masculine singular form of the intensive personal pronoun autos (αὐτός) is an experiential knowledge of Christ.
This is indicated by the fact that this word agrees in gender (masculine) and number (singular) and case (accusative) with the articular accusative masculine singular form of the proper name Christos (Χριστός), which appears in Ephesians 4:20.
The latter we noted contains the figure of metonymy which means that the person of Christ is put for an experiential knowledge of Him.
Therefore, the protasis of this first class conditional statement in Ephesians 4:21-24 is designed not only to persuade the recipients of this epistle to conclusion of the apodosis but is also to remind them of the contents in the apodosis, which they had been taught in the past.
Therefore, this protasis is designed not only to persuade the recipients of this letter to follow a particular course of action but it is also designed to remind them of this particular course of action and it is not only designed to persuade them regarding the contents of Ephesians 4:20 but also to remind them.
Therefore, it is not only designed to persuade them but also remind them that by no means whatsoever did living like unregenerate Gentile humanity cause each and every one of them as a corporate unit to learn about Christ through experience.
The contents of Ephesians 4:21-24 presents the reasons why this is the case.
Therefore, by means of this first class conditional statement in Ephesians 4:20-24, Paul is persuading as well as reminding these Gentile church age believers that by no means whatsoever did living like unregenerate Gentile humanity cause each and every one of them as a corporate unit to learn about Christ through experience.
Specifically, it is persuading them and thus reminding them that they learned about Christ through personal experience as a result of appropriating by faith their union and identification with Christ in His crucifixion, death, burial, resurrection and session at the right hand of the Father.
Simultaneously, they were appropriating by faith their new indwelling Christ nature because the nature of Christ is utilized by the believer who is experiencing the presence of Christ in their life, which is accomplished by appropriating faith their union and identification with Christ.
Therefore, this post-justification faith enabled them to learn through personal experience Christ’s crucifixion, death, resurrection and session at the right hand of the Father and thus to experience their new indwelling Christ nature.
The relationship between the protasis and the apodosis is evidence-inference, which means that the relation the protasis has to the apodosis is that of ground, or evidence with the apodosis presenting the inference.
Here the speaker infers something (the apodosis) from some evidence.
That is, he makes an induction about the implications that a piece of evidence suggests to him.
So therefore, the protasis in Ephesians 4:21-24 presents the evidence and the apodosis in Ephesians 4:20 presents the inference from the evidence presented in the protasis.
In Ephesians 4:21, the evidence is that these Gentile Christians conformed to an experiential knowledge of Christ in the sense that they obeyed Paul’s Spirit inspired apostolic teaching as a result of appropriating by faith their union and identification with Christ, which enabled them to experience their new indwelling Christ nature, which enabled them to manifest the character of Christ in their lives.
In Ephesians 4:22, the evidence is that the recipients of this epistle who were Gentile Christians were taught with reference to their pre-justification lifestyle to lay aside their indwelling old Adamic sin nature which is being corrupted in accordance its deceitful desires.
Then, in Ephesians 4:23, he taught them that they must do so in order to be renewed in the spirit of their mind.
Lastly, in Ephesians 4:24, the last piece of evidence is that they were taught that they must lay aside the indwelling old Adamic sin nature and instead put on the new indwelling Christ nature which has been created in God’s image by means of righteousness and holiness that comes from obeying the truth.
