God Offers Grace To All (Ephesians 2:1-10) Series

Today, we have the privilege of working through Ephesians 2:1-10. But let's start by rereading a little bit from last week. Ephesians 1:22-23:

(22) And all things/beings He subjected under his feet,

and him He gave as head over all things to/for the church,

(23) which is his body--the fullness of the One filling/fulfilling all things in all ways.

In these two verses, Paul talks about the status and position that God has now given Jesus. God used his power to set Jesus over all things, and all beings, so that everything is subject to him. God set Jesus at his right hand, so that Jesus is in charge with Him. And God did this for the sake of his church, which is Jesus' body.

So that's the situation that we find ourselves in, right now. In Christ, through our connection with Jesus, we are in a position of power and authority. We are also God's temple, and God fills us with himself. And this is true for all of us together, whether we are Jews by birth or Gentiles.

Paul then continues in Ephesians 2, without any real break in his argument, by talking about how all of this happened. How did we get here, in this lofty place of honor, with all of God's blessings, from where we started?

Now, the thing that's easy to miss in these verses is that Paul is once again deliberately writing as a Messianic Jew who believes that Jesus is the promised Savior. Paul speaks as a Jew who grew up living under the Mosaic covenant. And he deliberately describes the Ephesians as not like this, because they weren't. They were Gentiles. They knew nothing of Moses. They weren't rescued from Egypt. They didn't have that special covenant relationship with God.

So we'll see in this section that there are two groups. There is "you all," by which Paul refers to the Ephesians, who were Gentile by birth. And there's a "we" group, which is made up of Messianic Jews like Paul. Hearing this, and seeing it, is the key to understanding Ephesians 2 as a whole.

Before diving in, the other thing I should say is that most English Bibles are designed in a way that makes it so that every verse can be read by itself, as though each verse is a full independent sentence. Maybe it's to make it easier to memorize? I'm not sure. But what we'll see today, is that the verse numbering breaks up the text in weird ways. It helps to not get caught up on the numbering.

So let's start by reading Ephesians 2:1-3. In these verses, Paul paints a picture of who you Gentile Ephesians, and who we Jews, used to be:

(1) and (it was) you (plural)--

the ones being dead in your wrongdoings and sins,

(2) in which you all formerly walked

in accordance with the age of this world,

in accordance with the ruler of the authority of the air-- the one now working in the sons of disobedience--

(3) in which we also all lived formerly in the desires of our flesh,

doing the will of the flesh and of the mind,

and we were children by nature of wrath as also the rest of them--

Who were you? Paul holds up a mirror to who you used to be, and says, basically, that you were an ugly people. You were dead in your sins. You walked in a way that matched the way the world works. The age we live in a hostile, angry, selfish, uncaring one. And you walked step for step, in a way that matched this age. You also walked in a way that matched the way that satan works. Satan is the ruler of the authority of the air. You lived like Satan. You lived like he wanted you to live.

In verse 3, Paul goes on to say that you all weren't unique, in any of this. "We also" lived the same way. And again, Paul is writing as a Messianic Jew.

Now, do you see in verse 3 how Paul talks about "the flesh?"

"we also all lived formerly in the desires of our flesh,

doing the will of the flesh and of the mind,"

Some Bibles translate this as "sinful nature" (NLT), but that reads an awful lot of theology and meaning into this that's maybe not quite right.

Paul uses this word "flesh" to mean a few different things. But one of the most common goes something like this:

Our bodies all have natural strong desires. We get thirsty. We get hungry. We have sexual desires. We want to not feel pain. We want to feel pleasure. We want rest. Those are all things that our body-- our flesh-- wants. And our flesh isn't necessarily picky about how it obtains what it wants. When our flesh is hungry, it doesn't care if we satisfy that desire with junk food, or with good food. When we're thirsty, our flesh doesn't care if we satisfy that desire with an energy drink, or with something that doesn't have 50 chemicals. When our flesh has sexual desires, it doesn't care if fulfill those desires with our spouse, or with our computer, or with someone else's spouse. Our flesh isn't picky. And our flesh has no moral strength. It's vulnerable, and it's perfectly willing to satisfy those desires in the easiest, most convenient way.