God will do it; He sent His Holy Spirit to sanctify, to transform, to renew you in His image with power to walk in the beauty of holiness...Hallelujah! You have the faith to follow Him; He bestowed the gift of grace to you and now calls you His own. Look-up, stand-up and be free from the bondage of this world. Walk holy and worthy of your calling--not through your own strength but by letting go absolutely...Beloved, He has blessed you with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places--reach out and receive your blessings.
Pray, Read the book of Ephesians, Praise God!
Verses 2:1-10
By Grace Through Faith
Study Questions:2 And you were dead in
the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of
this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that
is now at work in the sons of disobedience—
3 among whom we all once lived
in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and
the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of
mankind.
4 But God, being rich in
mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,
5 even when we were dead in
our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been
saved—
6 and raised us up with him
and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,
7 so that in the coming ages he
might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in
Christ Jesus.
8 For by grace you have been
saved a through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift
of God,
9 not a result of
works, so that no one may boast.
10 For we are his
workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God
prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
1. How did we walk in our former life, before salvation?
2. Is grace a license to sin, to live any way you want to live?
3. What are you depending on to get you to heaven?
4. What role do works play in the Christians' salvation?
5. What do you learn about Satan from these verses?
6. Does God want us to help ourselves? Why or why not?
7. Have you received His gift? If not, will you receive it today? If you have received it, do you feel you need to "pay" God for the gift somehow? What does God Word say about the payment for His grace?
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Commentary from the ESV Bible for deeper study
Eph. 2:1–10 Salvation by Grace through Faith. This section, like 1:3–14 and 1:15–23, is a single sentence in the original Greek. The overarching theme is that God lavishes his grace on Christians through his saving initiative.
There are two subsections: 2:1–3 and 2:4–10.Eph. 2:1–3 Hopelessness and Helplessness without Christ. “God helps those who help themselves” is not from the Bible but from the ancient Greeks. As Paul emphasizes in this section, the truth is the exact opposite: God helps the helpless! Even more, he helps his enemies who have transgressed his holy law.Eph. 2:1 you were dead. Human beings as sons and daughters of Adam enter the world spiritually dead.
They have no inclination or responsiveness toward God and no ability to please God. Paul begins with this phrase then breaks off with other thoughts until he returns to it again in v. 5. trespasses. Violations of divine commandments. sins. Offenses against God in thought, word, or deed.
Eph. 2:2 prince . . . spirit. This refers to Satan as he dominates his human subjects, here called sons of disobedience, a Hebrew-inspired phrase like “sons of this world” in contrast to “sons of light” (Luke 16:8). They belong to the family of those who rebel against the holy and true God.Eph. 2:3 by nature. To be sons and daughters of Adam is to be born into a fallen state (Ps. 51:5) and subject to God's condemnation as children of wrath. To escape this hopeless imprisonment requires nothing short of a new birth or a new creation (Eph. 2:10).
Eph. 2:4–10 Hope in Christ. In contrast to the hopeless state of the nonbeliever, Christians exult in hope because of God's incredible grace and free salvation. Paul accents this grace in contrast to the pre-Christ hopelessness analyzed in vv. 1–3.Eph. 2:4 But God. No hopeless fate looks any grimmer than that which awaits the forlorn company of mankind marching behind the “prince of the power of the air” (v. 2) to their destruction under divine wrath. Just when things look the most desolate, Paul utters the greatest short phrase in the history of human speech: “But God!” rich in mercy. God's mercy on his helpless enemies flows from his own loving heart, not from anything they have done to deserve it.
Eph. 2:5 when we were dead. Paul resumes his original thought, which began with “you were dead” in v. 1. made us alive. That is, God gave us regeneration (new spiritual life within). This and the two verbs in v. 6 (“raised up” and “seated with”) make up the main verbs of the long sentence in vv. 1–10. Since Christians were dead, they first had to be made alive before they could believe (and God did that together with Christ). This is why salvation is by grace alone (see notes on v. 8; vv. 9–10).
Eph. 2:6–7 Raised us up with him means that, because of Christ's resurrection, those who believe in him are given new life spiritually in this age (regeneration). They will also be given renewed physical bodies when Christ returns (future resurrection). seated us with him in the heavenly places. God has allowed his people even now to share in a measure of the authority that Christ has, seated at the right hand of God (cf. 1:20–22; 6:10–18; James 4:7; 1 John 4:4), a truth that would be especially important in Ephesus with all of its occult practices
Verse 7 of ch. 2 answers the question of why God lavished such love upon his people: so that they will marvel for all of eternity over the incredible kindness and love of God. It will take all of eternity to fathom God's love, and those who are saved will never plumb the depths of it.
Eph. 2:8 By grace refers to God's favor upon those who have transgressed his law and sinned against him. But grace may also be understood as a “power” in these verses. God's grace not only offers salvation but also secures it. Saved refers to deliverance from God's wrath at the final judgment (Rom. 5:9); “by grace you have been saved” is repeated from Eph. 2:5 for emphasis. The verb form for “have been saved” (Gk. sesÅsmenoi, perfect tense) communicates that the Christian's salvation is fully secured. through faith.
Faith is a confident trust and reliance upon Christ Jesus and is the only means by which one can obtain salvation. this. The Greek pronoun is neuter, while “grace” and “faith” are feminine. Accordingly, “this” points to the whole process of “salvation by grace through faith” as being the gift of God and not something that we can accomplish ourselves. This use of the neuter pronoun to take in the whole of a complex idea is quite common in Greek (e.g., 6:1); its use here makes it clear that faith, no less than grace, is a gift of God. Salvation, therefore, in every respect, is not your own doing.
Eph. 2:9–10 Salvation is not by works. If it were, then those who are saved would get the glory. created . . . for good works. Salvation is not based on works, but the good works Christians do are the result and consequence of God's new creation work.
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I pray that you receive the gift of His grace, that you fellowshipped with the saints and praised His Holy Name today. Remember the value that God has placed on your life, your body, your soul---can you imagine sacrificing one child so another could live? Walk worthy of that sacrifice through gratitude, praise and peace Beloved sister and brother. Walk in love and let it abound when you go in and when you come out that those in darkness may see the hope in you and seek after the Father. God Bless and love, Sister Lisa
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