Lesson for March 7, 2021
The Book of Ephesians
Chapter 2:4-7
Verses 4-7
“But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”
But God tells what God provided for us when we were spiritually dead, controlled by Satan’s world system and controlled by our sin nature. Being rich in mercy sets the stage for what God provided. Mercy is grace in action and tells us that the plan of God for the human race is based on His grace. Love goes into action on our behalf. God has enough love for all of us. God’s love is great in magnitude. It is perfect because God’s character is perfect. God still loves us, will always loves us, nothing can change the love of God for us. God loves us whether we love Him or not. (I John 4:19)
Even when we were dead in our transgressions means we were spiritually dead, under the influence of Satan, and under the control of the sin nature. The Greek word for dead is “nekros” and the plural refers to spiritual death in every case, there are no exceptions. Being dead we were unable to do anything about it. So, God in His grace came to the rescue by providing salvation through the spiritual death of Christ on the Cross. And upon faith in Christ He made us alive, which means God imputed to us His eternal life. Together with Christ means that we were placed into union with Jesus Christ and share His eternal life and well as many other things. (Romans 5:6-11; I John 5:11-13)
By grace you have been saved explains how we are made alive together with Christ. It is by means of a non-meritorious act of faith alone in Christ alone. Grace is all that God is free to do for man on the basis of the Cross. God is actually freed from the confinements of His own perfect character to do something for us. So, grace is God’s freedom to express His love to mankind without jeopardizing any part of His character. The Cross freed God to save us permanently. Therefore, grace is the plan of God, the work of God, and the expression of God’s perfection. Grace means very simply that God does all the work and man does all of the benefiting without the work. Grace is a plan, a policy, a function, a mechanic of divine operation on our behalf. Grace depends upon the essence or the character of God. Therefore, grace depends on Who and what God is. Grace is what God can do for man and be consistent with His own character or essence. This is why propitiation is so important.
Believers must sort out the different between grace and legalism. Legalism is man’s ability, man’s works, man’s actions intruding into the plan of God. Anything that man adds into the plan of God is no good. If it was accepted it would destroy grace. The plan of God, however, is not destroyed because grace rejects our talent, our ability, our concepts, anything that we have and regard as beneficial. Man’s plans and God’s plans cannot successfully coexist. This immediately sets up in the soul a great conflict. The principle under grace is that the greatest thing that God can do for any believer is to make that believer like His Son.
God has a personalized plan for you. God was thinking of you in eternity past when He designed your plan. This is one of the reasons you are here on earth: to learn and fulfill God’s plan for your life. Failure to discover His plan and obey its commands will lead to a life of misery and guilt. On the other hand, if you discover God’s plan and fulfill it (regardless of how long it takes to do either), you will experience an amazing life of peace, joy and happiness beyond compare.
And raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. We have both the doctrine of the resurrection of Christ, the doctrine of the baptism of the Holy Spirit and the doctrine of propitiation in verse six.
In John 11:25, Jesus said to Martha, “I am the Resurrection and the Life. He who believes in Me will live even if He dies.” Because of the Resurrection, believers in Christ have hope (confident expectation) of their own resurrection at the Rapture of the Church. Just as the death of a believer is the Lord’s victory, so the resurrection of believers is the Lord’s victory. The resurrection of believers is the wise and sovereign decision of God. This means that a believer’s volition and individual merit are not factors in the Resurrection or the Rapture of the Church. The Resurrection is strictly God’s victory. So, we have no control over the manner or time of our resurrection. This is completely a matter of the wisdom and sovereignty of God. Your resurrection does not depend in any way on your merit or your life. Winners and losers alike receive a resurrection body, equally. No distinction is made between winners and losers at the point of receiving resurrection bodies.
So, resurrection is far greater than we can imagine. In resurrection, God makes no distinction between those who completely fail to live the Christian Way of Life and those who succeed in living the Christian Way of Life. The resurrection has nothing to do with our winning the tactical victory in the Angelic Conflict or failing to do so. It has everything to do with Who and what the Lord is! Resurrection is one thing you must completely divorce from any principle of spiritual merit! The time, place, and manner of the resurrection of the Church are God’s perfect decision based on the completion of the Royal Family of God.
Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father. This means that God the Father is completely satisfied or propitiated with Christ’s work on the Cross of paying the penalty of sin for the entire human race. The Greek word for propitiation is “hilasmos” and means to appease the wrath of an offended party or to satisfy the just demands of someone who has been offended. Since God is absolutely righteous, He must judge sin wherever He finds it. The Bible is very clear that all human beings are born with a sin nature and are spiritually separated from God. We know from Scripture that no one possesses the righteousness necessary to spend eternity with a perfectly righteous God. In other words, God’s perfect righteousness cannot have fellowship with man’s relative righteousness. God is offended (not shocked) by the lack of righteousness and subsequent sinful condition of man. It is this offense and, therefore, God’s wrath that must be appeased. God’s wrath is an anthropropathism to explain His policy with regard to man’s sin. (John 3:36; Romans 3:10-12, 23; 6:23; Isaiah 59:2, 64:6)
God’s integrity (holiness) must be satisfied. God’s integrity is made up of His righteousness and His justice. God’s righteousness is the standard or principle of His integrity and must condemn sin. The judgment that God pronounced upon sin was spiritual death. Mankind, therefore, comes under the wrath and impending judgment of God. (Romans 3:9, 23) We cannot forget that the other half of God’s integrity is justice. Justice is the function or action of God’s integrity. Therefore, what the righteousness of God condemns the justice of God judges. In the case of human beings, God’s righteousness and justice must be satisfied (propitiated). Mankind is born physically alive but spiritually dead (separated from God). Under the sentence of spiritual death, man is helpless to remedy the situation. (Romans 3:25-26)
Since the sentence that God pronounced on sin is spiritual death, only spiritual death could satisfy the just demands of God’s righteousness. Only one Person in history was qualified to meet this just demand. Jesus Christ literally became the propitiation for the sin of the entire world. By His impeccable (sinless) life and spiritual death, Jesus satisfied the perfect righteousness of God that was demanded by the Law of Moses. (I John 2:1-2, 4:10)
The baptism of the Holy Spirit is neither seen nor felt. It is a fact stated in the Word of God for us to believe. Technically, it is when the believer is placed into union with Jesus Christ at salvation. The word for baptism in Greek is “baptisma” and literally means “to dip.” It was used to describe the dyeing of a garment or the drawing of wine by dipping the cup into the bowl. Since John the Baptist and Jesus used the word to describe water baptism as submersion, the accurate interpretation of the word is “to dip into or submerge.” (I Corinthians 12:13) When a person trusts Christ as Savior, they are positionally “dipped into” or “submerged” into the “body of Christ.” This, of course, is speaking of positional truth, signifying our union with Christ. Water baptism for believers has always been a picture of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Submersion into water pictures how the believer becomes united with Christ. (Romans 6:3-5; Galatians 3:27; Ephesians 4:4-5)
So that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. God is glorified by giving believers super-grace blessings. The ages to come refer to eternity where Jesus Christ will pour out blessings that will surpass our greatest imagination. The Greek word for surpassing is “huperballo,” which means to throw beyond or throw over. The Greek word for riches is “ploutos,” which includes any blessing associated with happiness (even materialistic things). God has all the wealth and whether we know it or not He is going to give it to us forever and ever and ever. His grace in kindness means generosity based on His grace and something we do not deserve. All victory and all blessing belong to Christ and we share that victory and blessing.