As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
I’m sure you all remember the old Westerns of both the large and small screen. Whenever the Sheriff was pursuing one of the bad guys, posters would be plastered around town with the bad guy’s likeness and the words: “Wanted: Dead or Alive”. That’s the title I have chosen for my sermon today but with this twist… I have put a question mark at the end on purpose. It is my belief that we are all wanted by our creator and redeemer, but it is our choice whether we come to him dead or alive. Those are the two choices presented to us by the Apostle Paul in this passage. We may either remain dead in our transgressions and sins, or we may be made alive in Jesus Christ. Let’s look at these two options in greater detail…
Dead in Sin
In Ephesians 2:1-3, Paul talks about our being dead in transgressions and sins. It is essential to note that Paul here is talking about all human beings. Yes, he is addressing his Gentile readers in Ephesus directly when he says emphatically, “You, you were dead in your transgressions and sins.” But then he goes on to note that all of us were like this at one time, whether we be Jews or Gentiles. This is Paul’s estimate of every human being apart from Jesus Christ. Here, Paul condenses into three verses what he explains in the first three chapters of Romans. And in these three verses, Paul highlights three appalling truths about human beings apart from Jesus Christ…
We were dead.
Paul says, “As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins.” What kind of death is Paul talking about? The words “in transgressions and sins” make it obvious. It is a moral death, a spiritual death. This is not to say that the person who does not have a relationship with Christ does not, at least sometimes, do right things. Paul makes this clear in Romans 2:14-15 where he says…
Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them.
So, all people, at times do what God requires. The problem is that none of us live up to God’s standards 100% of the time. Paul uses two words here in Ephesians to describe what has gone wrong and continues to go wrong with us as human beings. Apart from Christ we are dead in our transgressions and sins. The word translated as transgressions is παραπτώμασιν in Greek. It means “a falling away, lapse, slip, or false step”. And the word for sins is ἁμαρτίαις which means “to miss the mark or fall short”.
Some people have gotten the wrong idea from what Paul is saying here. We hear the word “sinner”, and we think of the worst people we have ever known. But Paul is not saying that we are all as bad as we could be. He is simply saying that none of us are as good as God created us to be. We have slipped, we have missed the mark, we have fallen short. Have any of us loved God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength 100% of the time? Have any of us loved our neighbor as ourselves 100% of the time? I think if we are honest, we will confess that we have not done either one of these things 100% of the time in thought, word, and deed. And it is from these slip ups and missing of the mark that all human evil proceeds.
We were living a life that was no life.
Paul goes on to describe our human predicament in even greater detail. He does not use the word “enslaved” in this passage like he does in Romans, but he is talking about the same thing. Specifically, Paul mentions three things that seem to dominate and control human life apart from Christ. In short, there are three things that seek to enslave us. Paul talks about the world, the ruler of the kingdom of the air, and the flesh. Let’s examine each of these powerful forces in turn…
First, Paul talks about how we “follow the ways of this world”. The word for world is κόσμου from which we get our English world “cosmos”. Paul is not talking about the created world, God’s beautiful creation which he made good in the beginning. Paul, like John, is talking about this world system that is set against God. Literally, Paul says, “And you being dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the age of this world…” Paul is thinking in traditionally Jewish terms of the two ages. There is this age in which we live and then there is the age to come when God will set all things to right. Paul is warning us against allowing this present age to cloud our vision of the age to come.
Secondly, Paul warns us against becoming enslaved by the ruler of the kingdom of the air. Paul talks about our having “walked according to the ruler of the authority of the air, the spirit now working in the sons of disobedience.”
This is a reference to Satan, or the devil, who was viewed as having control over the atmosphere surrounding the earth. In the terminology of the later church, this teaching developed into a warning against the world, the flesh, and the devil—the three ancient enemies of the human race.
Thirdly, Paul warns us about how “the flesh” can potentially enslave us. Paul says we “once lived in the desires of our flesh, doing the things willed of the flesh and of its thoughts.”
By the word “flesh” Paul does not mean our bodies. Rather, he is talking about our sin nature that still clings to us and tries to enslave us. It is a sin nature inherited from the first human beings.
We were deserving of wrath.
Finally, Paul wraps up his description of our horrible state apart from Christ by saying, “Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath.”
“Wrath” is one of those words most people have a violent reaction against these days. The word conjures up images like Jonathan Edwards’ famous sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. Thus, some people question, “Can’t we dispense with this language and simply focus on a loving God?”
I think the answer is both “yes” and “no”. “Yes” I believe in focusing on the love of God. But “no” I don’t believe we can dispense with the language of wrath. And here’s why… I believe God loves us so much that he will not rest content until we become all that he has created and redeemed us to be. God has a righteous anger and wrath against all which seeks to destroy his beautiful creation. As I have said many times, “God is not mad at us. He is mad about us.” So, in his love, God will, if we let him, burn away in his fiery wrath all the impurities that cling to us in our sinful state. Like the silversmith, he will keep boiling the silver until he sees his reflection in us. His perfect, fiery wrath must do its work, until God sees his reflection in us.
Alive in Christ
So much for the bad news of our sinful state. Beginning in verse 4, Paul focuses on the good news. Here we have one of the biggest, most important “buts” in the Bible: “But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.”
We have a choice. It is the most important choice we must make for all eternity. It is the choice between remaining dead in our sin or allowing God to make us alive in Christ.
To understand what Paul is saying in verses 4 through 10, I propose that we ask and seek to answer two questions.
What has God done?
That’s the first question. The answer is summed up in one word: God has saved us. “By grace you have been saved.” Verses 4 through 10 are almost like a hymn celebrating the glories of God’s grace in Christ by which we have been saved, rescued, restored.
The word “saved” is a perfect participle. I’m not great at grammar. But in this case, grammar is important because the perfect participle emphasizes the ongoing consequences of God’s saving action. It is as if Paul is saying, “You have been saved, and you will remain saved forever.”
Now, I realize that “salvation” language is not that meaningful to most of us, perhaps because we have never been in a physical situation in which we were saved or rescued. Once you have experienced salvation in the physical dimension, it is easier to transfer that understanding to the spiritual dimension.
Paul helps us out here by giving us vivid detail about what our salvation in Christ encompasses. First, God made us alive together with Christ (verse 5). Second, God raised us up with Christ (verse 6a). And third, God seated us with Christ in the heavenly places (verse 6b). These three statements refer to real events in the life of Christ: his resurrection, his ascension, and what is sometimes called his session. This is what we confess in one of the earliest creeds of the church, The Apostles’ Creed: “The third day he rose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.”
As exciting as these truths about Jesus are, there is something even more exciting for us in what Paul is saying. Paul is telling us that by grace through faith we have become identified with Jesus and so what is true of Jesus is also true of us. We have been raised. We have ascended. We are seated with Jesus in the heavenlies. This is amazing stuff.
So often we think of the Christian life as being about trying to be a good person. Or maybe we think that being a Christian is about believing certain things. Or maybe it is about going to church. While all these things are important, being a Christian is about so much more. We have been identified with Christ, and so what is true of him is also true of us. Even though we have not seen the physical realization of these realities yet, Paul treats us as already having these spiritual realities in our possession. We have already been raised from the dead. We are already ascended to heaven. We are already seated on thrones next to God with all evil under our feet. We are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
Why has God done this for us?
That is the second key question. Paul makes it clear that what prompted God to act on our behalf was not something in us, but something in God. Paul uses four key words to describe the motivation behind God’s indescribable gift of salvation.
Love
God was motivated by ἀγάπην. We have already begun to explore how Agape is the key word in this entire letter. We sometimes call it unconditional love. But it is so much more than that. God’s love for us is actually contra-conditional. God loves us in spite of our sin. Paul says that God saved us because of the great love with which he loved us. Paul can’t seem to stop talking about God’s love. He heaps love word on top of love word to try to describe it.
Mercy
Another key word that describes God’s motivation is mercy. In Greek the word is: ἐλέει. You may be familiar with the liturgical prayer: Kyrie eleison. “Lord have mercy.” ἐλέει is the Greek word that is often used to translate the Old Testament word “hesed” which is the Hebrew word describing God’s covenant love. It is sometimes translated as “lovingkindness”.
Grace
χάριτί is another key word. We have talked about this word a lot, especially in our examination of Galatians. It means “God’s undeserved favor”. God inclines himself towards us simply because he wants to do so, simply because he chooses to do so. We cannot do anything to earn God’s favor, and we cannot do anything to lose it either.
Kindness
The fourth key word Paul uses to describe God’s motivation for saving us is χρηστότητι. In English this is translated as “kindness”. But the word can also be translated as goodness, excellence, or gentleness. It’s the kind of kindness by which God meets our real need, our deepest need. We may not have a felt need for salvation, we may not sense our need for it, but it is, nonetheless, our deepest need. All these key words make it clear that salvation is not something we achieve. Rather, as Paul says, “we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Literally, we are God’s ποίημα. We get our English word “poem” from this Greek word. Another way of saying this is that we are God’s artwork, his masterpiece.
There are times in this life when we would like to jump off the easel and see how God’s painting of us is coming along. But life doesn’t work like that. Making a great work of art takes time, even a lifetime. At the final judgment we will get to see what God has been doing all along. But for now, what Paul is telling us is that God is painting a portrait that is coming to life. If we so choose, we can be made alive in Christ.
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