In verses 8 and 9 of Ephesians 2 we come to some words that are so familiar to those who have been Christians for a while, that they are almost too familiar. We’ve heard them preached and taught and debated; used as a sword against legalism, and unfortunately, a shield against any call to service.
Oddly enough, as familiar as verses 8 and 9 are, verse 10 seldom gets quoted.
We’re not quite so anxious, are we, to shout from the rooftops that perhaps God’s very purpose in making and shaping us, has been all along, so that we might perform works!
That confuses the issue. If I am trying to present the argument to the new convert, or the old legalist, that Christianity is a matter of faith and not works, then I may only be handing him a cache of ammunition, if I drag verse 10 out into the light.
So let’s preach sermons on Ephesians 2:8,9 and go away rejoicing that God requires nothing of us but faith, and even gives us that faith so that there can be no boasting, even in that. Let’s save the teaching of where doing good works would fit in, for when we’re studying James. James is a difficult letter anyway. Let’s leave the works ‘thing’ alone until then, and for now, rejoice with one another that we’re saved by grace through faith, and that not of ourselves. Then next Sunday, or maybe two Sundays from now, when we’ve had a guest speaker or a holiday sermon and everyone has forgotten what the preacher said anyway... ...go on to verse 11 and rejoice again as we see how gracious God has been to the gentiles, to bring us near by the blood of Christ.
That’s the tendency. It must be; because verses 8 and 9 seem to get a lot more press than verse 10. Just for giggles I checked the website that I send my own sermons to, and compared the number of sermons there on Ephesians 2:8,9, with those on Ephesians 2:10. Without boring you with numbers; there were a little over twice as many on verses 8 and 9 as there were that included verse 10.
So here’s what we’re going to do today.
We’re going to look at verses 8 through 10 of Ephesians 2, and we’re just going to take a deep breath, leap into the cool waters, and talk about works, works, works!
NOT OF WORKS
Ok, just for the sake of refreshing, let’s read the verses;
“For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not as a result of works, that no one should boast.”
Now I want the main point of our focus today to be on verse 10, and a very specific challenge that comes through that verse.
But we have to spend some time here first, because our understanding of verse 10 is dependant upon a good and healthy grasp of verses 8 and 9.
Paul is the supreme preacher of grace (second to our Lord, of course). He who confidently asserted that if there was any boasting to be done, he could do it.
Listen!
“If anyone else has a mind to put confidence in the flesh, I far more; circumcised on the eighth day, of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, as to the Law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to the righteousness which is in the Law, found blameless.”
Now a lot of that doesn’t mean much to our western, modern day ears. I would dare say that if you read these words of Paul’s to anyone outside the church of God, they’d say, ’so what?’ ’big deal!’ ‘What is there in all that to boast of?’
Well, ok, so let’s bring it home a little. I could say, and proudly, “I am an American born. A product of the noble families of Tanner and Lockwood, of upstate New York. I am the son of a preacher and a preacher myself. Before that, I was a police officer, and a good one. Before that I served my country in Viet Nam during a time of war. I have a college degree, but much of what is important in life, I have learned by my own experience. I am a homeowner with a beautiful, intelligent, faithful wife, and we make beautiful children...” am I boring you yet?
What would your own boasts be? I’m sure you could come up with such a list in very little time.
Paul was able to boast of his national heritage, his zeal in his religion and the performance of his religious duties, his meticulous care in keeping himself untainted by the world so that nothing would interfere with his temple worship. Those things were important to the first century Jew, and they are very important to the orthodox Jew today.
So Paul is saying to us, ‘If you think you can justify yourself in your boasting of all the things that make you, you, in the economy and philosophy of the world, I can boast too; so before you get on your high horse and tell me what a good Christian man or woman you are, listen to this!”
“Whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish in order that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.”
Those things he said to the Philippians, believer, he is saying right here in Ephesians 2:8,9.
‘You have nothing to boast in. Not even the exercise of the faith that saved you, because God even gave you that!”
And I think all of us here today can understand this. It’s no difficult theological truth for us to grasp. In fact, if you really understand what Paul has put to you here in verse 8 and 9, you must be very relieved.
To think that I am not expected or required to do anything to attain to salvation.
My redemption back to God is all of Him, and not of myself. Free! Absolutely free, by faith, which He even supplies to me. This should come to us as the greatest news ever, hearer! Where is boasting? It is excluded, much to my relief. Because if I can boast, then I am obligated to something. To do something. To provide something. To supply something. And I am such a failure at times, I just know that if my redemption is to any degree dependant on me, then at some point I’m going to blow it; therefore, my salvation is not secure. It is not sure and absolute. And my boasting must then be accompanied by trembling.
But wait! I notice that verse eight starts with the word “For”, and that reminds me that Paul is basing verses 8 and 9 on what he has said previously.
Then I remember Pastor Clark’s sermon on verse 7, and I realize that I am focusing way too much on myself here.
I remember that the primary purpose in the plan of salvation is to glorify God the Father, and vindicate His Holy name forever. It’s all about Him anyway.
So I take my eyes off myself, and what salvation has done for me, and how it came about for me, and I look to Him. I let Ephesians 2 cause me to focus my spiritual eyes entirely on Him, and I shout “Glory, glory to His name forever! Because He saved me by the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward me in Christ Jesus; and He did it without my help, my desiring, and in fact without my even knowing. And He did it so that forever and without end, I would be a living testament to His love and mercy and grace. It’s all about Him!”
WE ARE HIS WORKMANSHIP
Now I want to move on to verse 10, and the first thing I want you to see is that we’re still talking about God. It’s still all about Him. It’s about what He has done. His works.
“For we are His workmanship...”
Again, what a relief. In contrast to this, consider the words of E. K. Simpson, who declared, “A ‘self-made’ man is almost inevitably badly made, a jerry-built sample of overweening self-esteem...”
But we are God’s workmanship, therefore we are assured of at least two things; one, we are not badly made, but perfectly made. And two, again, there can be no boasting on our part.
We cannot sing with Sinatra, “I did it my way.” Speaking of overweening, (over-confident) self-esteem... Listen to the lyrics of that song sometime, and ask yourself, ‘what kind of man thinks so highly of himself, that it doesn’t even embarrass him to sing this tripe?’
I want you to see that we are God’s workmanship, and that that work was done through Christ Jesus. We are created “in Christ Jesus”.
In a general way, God created all things. He created us in that He spoke all things into existence and apart from Him nothing was made that has been made.
But this message of Paul’s in Ephesians 2 is much more specific than that. Here, he is repeating the message of II Corinthians 5:17.
That, “...if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature, the old things passed away behold, new things have come.”
Do you remember back to the sermon on verse 5, when I described the zombie-like decadent creature that is a picture of how God sees the person dead in trespasses and sins? Well I want you to know that God does not take that decaying, venom-dripping thing and make it a Christian.
He makes a new creation. Through Christ Jesus, He creates. He creates through the Creator.
John 1 tells us that Christ is the Word, and that in the beginning the Word was with God and the Word was God, and that all things were made by Him.
So in perfect, divine consistency with His attributes and His character, God the Father, through the Word, the second Person of the Godhead, the one who spoke light out of darkness, created us.
“For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus...” “And God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good”.
Now I want you to see some of the things the Bible says about us, now that we are a new creation in Christ. I want you to see the splendor of God’s workmanship.
First, let me repeat that God did not refurbish, or renew, or renovate that old dead zombie thing. Romans 6:6 tells us that our old self was crucified. Put to death. It is out of the way, and it is but for us to daily reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ.
Next, we see that the new self, the newly created child of God that we are in Christ Jesus, is a partaker of the divine nature. 2 Pet 1:4 says, “...He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, in order that by them you might become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.”
So this is God’s workmanship so far. He created us anew in Christ Jesus, and placed in us, His own divine nature.
Next we see that His workmanship continues. As in the general creation of all things, He did not just create, like starting a clock, and then sit back to let it tick away on it’s own. God has always been and always will be significantly at work in His creation; and so it is with us, His new creation. His workmanship.
We call it ‘sanctification’. It is an on-going process of conforming us to the image of His son.
I John 4:12 tells us that, “...God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us.”
And Colossians 1:27 says that Christ in us is the hope of glory.
So God’s perfect workmanship displayed in us, is that He made us brand new in Christ Jesus, imparted to us His divine nature, continues the sanctifying work of perfecting love in us and making us more like Jesus, and by the very presence of Christ in us, assures us of future glory with Him.
Are we sliding back into thinking it’s all about us? That’s so easy to do. But look.
CREATED FOR GOOD WORKS
We were created for good works. And if God created us in Christ Jesus for good works, then doesn’t it stand to reason that those good works are also to bring glory to the name of the Father?
Let’s discuss this.
What are the good works that Paul is talking about? We could get pretty bogged down right here, couldn’t we?
Should we try to make a list of potential good works? Wow. Think about that. How long could we sit, each with a pen and a tablet of paper, brainstorming and coming up with any little thing to do that might be considered a ’good work’.
That would be time consuming, and maybe even a little confusing, and probably a little controversial, once we begin to compare lists and debate the virtues of one another’s ideas of what comprises a good work.
I think it can be put much more simply than making a list.
In John 5:19,20 Jesus says to His Jewish critics;
“Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner. For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself is doing;...”
We have confirmation in various places, that He always did those things that were pleasing to the Father. In the garden He prayed, ’Not My will, but Thy will be done”. There are so many other passages throughout the gospels and numerous also in the epistles, that confirm to us that as our great Example, Jesus prayed to the Father, sought the will of the Father, obeyed the Father, brought glory to the Father...
...and there are just as many, exhorting us to imitate Jesus; not only this, but confirming to us that as His believers, His disciples, we certainly will imitate Jesus.
The best evidence comes straight from the mouth of our Lord;
“Truly, Truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go to the Father.”
How do we get around that one, fellow Christian?
“The works that I do shall he do also”? How can that be? Surely, Jesus was only talking about the apostles.
Because Jesus healed and did miracles. Jesus raised the dead and made water into wine and multiplied the fish and loaves, and walked on water and made the blind eyes see, and cleansed the leper...
How do we deal with that? And we must, you know. We have to confront this and deal with it, because Jesus didn’t say, “My apostles will to that which I do”; He said,
“...he who believes in Me...”
I believe in Him. Do you? If you do, then you must get in line with the rest of us, the line that forms behind “the works that I do shall he do also”, and knowing that Paul said we were created for good works, ask yourself, ’Why am I not doing the things Jesus did?’
I’ll tell you this with assured confidence, folks; that if all Christians everywhere suddenly understood that we, by the Holy Spirit, should be accomplishing all the same things that Jesus did ~ from miracles to the kind of personal sacrifice that led to Calvary‘s crest~ a whole lot of “What Would Jesus Do” bracelets would be headin’ for the trash.
Why do we fall so far short? Why aren’t we praying for the sick and seeing them healed? And please don’t tell me that was for the first century church and stopped with the demise of the Apostles. That’s bunk. The Father hasn’t changed; Jesus hasn’t changed; the Holy Spirit, who indwells you and me, hasn’t changed.
What has changed, is that the Church of Jesus Christ, in all it’s hair-splitting debates over faith and works, predestination, end times doctrines, and whatever other silly argument that comes down the pike, has lost sight of the fact that Jesus lived an example of obedience to and imitation of the Father, so that we would follow in His steps, and in the strength and power and authority of His Holy Spirit, walk a walk of obedience and imitation of Christ!
Now my job is to teach you biblical theology and the doctrines of our faith, and practical application of God’s divine word. Not to teach you my experiences and expect you to build your doctrines on those.
But I have to tell you here, that I have seen people, in my own lifetime and before my own eyes, instantly healed of various physical ailments and maladies. I myself, on one occasion that will remain vivid in my memory forever, prayed with an individual and saw him instantly cured of an illness as we prayed.
God has not changed, and He is the same God who prepared good works before hand, for us to walk in. We are His workmanship, and what He has made by His own design and His own hand, is new creatures in Christ Jesus, fashioned specifically to move out and walk in good works.
Do you want to know what good works God has prepared for you to do? Do you really want to know? If you do, I’ll tell you.
Study the life of Jesus. Study His compassion for the lost. Study His attentive obedience to the Father’s will. Study His anger at hypocrisy and His loathing of sin’s wages. Study His willingness and determination to sacrifice Himself completely in order that His life might glorify the Father. Study His divine humility and patience, in being willing to do what was given Him to do and wait for the Father to exalt Him, instead of exalting Himself.
Study well. Study with prayer. Ask God to enlighten your spiritual eyes to understand the mission and purpose of Christ in this world and now in you. Because believer, as you study these things, you will clearly see that the good works God has prepared for you to do, are exemplified in Christ.
Then there is nothing for you to do but follow in them. Walk in them. You’ve got it to do.
WORKS, WORKS, WORKS...
As I close I want to step back and look at these three verses in panorama.
What stands out?
The word ‘work’ . Do you see what Paul has done here?
First, remember that he has just said that in making us alive, and raising us up with Christ, and seating us in the heavenly places in Him, was so that forever and without end He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us.
Remember that we said our salvation is to the glory of the Father, forever.
And see that, having established that, and showing us that it’s really not about us; but that it’s really all about God, then Paul declares, (If you’ll allow a paraphrase)
“You’re not saved by works...it’s really about God’s work in making you...and He made you, fashioned you, into a vessel designed to do works; and not just any works, but works that He prepared for you to do before you were even born, with the intention that you are to walk in them.”
That’s it in a nutshell, Christian. That’s what we are, and what we’re all about.
We were created in Christ Jesus, by the Master workman, for His glory, for His purpose; and the only way we will find our purpose...the only hope we have of fulfilling our destiny, is to examine the life and work of the One we call ‘Lord’, and leaving self and the flesh behind, say, “I can do nothing of myself, unless it is something I see my Jesus doing...and He loves me, and shows me all things that He Himself is doing, that I might walk in them”
Does this sound grandiose to you fellow disciple? Is it overwhelming? Does it cause you to say to yourself, “But if I try to go the way this preacher seems to be saying, it might change my entire lifestyle! It would call for a radical change in my priorities, my plans, everything I thought my future would be!”
I hope it does, because that is exactly what I’m telling you today, friend. You search the scriptures, and you find me just one person who stepped out in discipleship to Christ, whose life was not turned to an entirely different path than they had thought they were going. Find me one, whose very existence was not radically, and explosively changed. You won’t. They aren’t there.
They either walked away sad because they were too full of this world, or they left everything worldly and followed Him to glory.
The works have been prepared for you, and you have literally been fashioned by God’s own workmanship to walk in them. All you need to do is watch Jesus, see Him working, and do what He does.
You’re not saved by works
But you are the product of God’s works
Designed to walk in good works.
And it’s for His ultimate glory. It’s really all about Him.
