Ephesians 4.21a-The Gentile Christian Community Conformed to an Experiential Knowledge of Christ
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Thursday August 21, 2025
Ephesians Series: Ephesians 4:21a-The Gentile Christian Community Conformed to an Experiential Knowledge of Christ
Lesson # 267
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.
The apodosis of this first class condition appears in Ephesians 4:20, which we noted 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 4:21, 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 in Ephesians 4:21 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.
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, 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.
Now, the enclitic particle ge (γέ) functions as a marker of emphasis and thus adds emphasis to the protasis of this first class condition.
Therefore, it emphasizes with the Gentile Christian community that they conformed to Jesus Christ, which Paul explains as being taught by Him through personal experience because obedience to the truth corresponds to an experiential knowledge of Jesus.
Now, the protasis of this first class condition contains three assertions: (1) auton ēkousate (αὐτὸν ἠκούσατε), “each and every one of you as a corporate unit in fact conformed to Him” (Author’s translation) (2) kai en autō edidachthēte (καὶ ἐν αὐτῷ ἐδιδάχθητε), “Specifically, each and every one of you as a corporate unit were taught about Him through personal experience” (Author’s translation) (3) estin alētheia en tō Iēsou (ἐστιν ἀλήθεια ἐν τῷ Ἰησοῦ), “obedience to the truth corresponds to an experiential knowledge of Jesus” (Lecturer’s translation).
The second assertion is epexegetical and thus serves to explain the first while the third assertion explains the reason the first two are true.
In the first assertion, the referent of the accusative masculine singular form of the intensive personal pronoun autos (αὐτός) is the referent of the articular accusative masculine singular form of the proper name Christos (Χριστός), which appears at the end of Ephesians 4:20.
This is indicated by the fact that they agree in gender (masculine), number (singular) as well as case (accusative).
As we noted in our study of Ephesians 4:20, the referent of the former is a personal experiential knowledge of Jesus Christ since the word contains the figure of metonymy, which means that the person of Christ is put for an experiential knowledge of Him.
This interpretation is supported by the fact that in context Paul is presenting 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 and the latter is based upon obedience to the indwelling old Adamic sin nature and Satan’s cosmic world system, which results in sin and rebellion against God.
An experiential knowledge of the person of Jesus Christ speaks of the church age believer personally encountering the person of Jesus Christ and also being affected by this encounter in that they gain more practical wisdom and as a result they mature with regards to Christian character.
The child of God personally encounters the person of Jesus Christ by exercising faith in the Spirit inspired Scriptures and being affected by this encounter in that they gain a practical wisdom and more of the character of Christ.
So therefore, an “experiential knowledge” of the person of the Lord Jesus Christ involves the believer personally encountering Him through the process of fellowship as He is revealed by the Holy Spirit in the pages of Scripture and prayer and being affected by this encounter with the Lord.
In Ephesians 4:21, the intensive personal pronoun autos (αὐτός) is fronted for emphasis and thus emphasizes a personal experiential knowledge about Christ is what Paul is speaking about in this first class conditional statement in Ephesians 4:20-24.
The verb akouō (ἀκούω) in Ephesians 4:21 pertains to listening or paying attention to a person, with resulting conformity to what is advised or commanded.
The referent of the second person plural form of this verb is the recipients of this letter, who were Gentile Christian community living throughout the Roman province of Asia and the word not only speaks of them as a corporate unit but is also used in a distributive sense emphasizing no exceptions.
The accusative masculine singular form of the intensive personal pronoun autos (αὐτός) functions as the accusative direct object of this verb, which indicates that a personal experiential knowledge of Jesus Christ receives the action of being conformed to by the Gentile Christian community.
Therefore, the verb akouō (ἀκούω) speaks of the recipients of this epistle “conforming to” an experiential knowledge of Christ, which took place when they obeyed Paul’s Spirit inspired teaching as a result of appropriating by faith their union and identification with Christ.
This enabled them to experience their new indwelling Christ nature.
This in turn enabled them to manifest the character of Christ in their lives.
Consequently, this obedience enabled them to possess an experiential knowledge of Christ.
Therefore, in Ephesians 4:21, the verb akouō (ἀκούω) speaks of the recipients of this epistle “conforming to” an experiential knowledge of Christ as a result of obeying Paul’s Spirit inspired apostolic teaching to live like Christ.
This is accomplished by appropriating by faith their union and identification with Christ, which enables them to experience their new indwelling Christ nature.
This interpretation is indicated by the fact that the assertion, which follows it, namely kai en autō edidachthēte (καὶ ἐν αὐτῷ ἐδιδάχθητε) is epexegetical in that it explains the meaning of the statement auton ēkousate (αὐτὸν ἠκούσατε).
Therefore, this indicates that when Paul speaks about the recipients of this epistle conforming to an experiential knowledge of Christ, he means being taught about Him through personal experience.
