Ephesians 2 | This Chapter Is Essential for Every Christian

What is the significance of being dead in sin? 
What does Ephesians 2 say about salvation by grace?  
What does it mean to be God’s workmanship? 

Ephesians 2 is a foundational chapter that beautifully unpacks the transformative power of grace and unity in Christ. Paul emphasizes that we were once spiritually dead, lost in our sins, and following the world’s corrupt ways. Yet, through God's rich mercy and love, we are made alive in Christ. This gift of grace is not something we earn; it is freely given, leading us to walk in good works prepared by God. The chapter highlights how Christ breaks down barriers, uniting Jews and Gentiles as one body. This unity is built on Christ, the cornerstone, and creates a new humanity in which all believers are joined together as God’s holy temple.

The chapter is also a strong rebuttal to the idea that only specific groups need salvation. Paul makes it clear that all were once enslaved by sin and need redemption. The unity that Christ brings transcends past divisions, fostering one family of believers with shared faith and purpose. Paul urges the Ephesians to embrace this unity by recognizing that Christ’s work on the cross reconciles all believers, creating a collective identity built on peace. This message is not just for individual churches but for the global Church across time.

Paul also reaffirms God’s sovereign plan, hinting at predestination and how believers were chosen for good works before the world’s foundation. The message of predestination can be a challenging topic, yet Paul combines it with the truth that grace is available to everyone. This balance between divine sovereignty and human responsibility invites believers to trust God’s plan while actively living out their faith. The final verses emphasize the collective role of the Church as a unified body, where each believer contributes to building God’s dwelling place.

The chapter concludes by encouraging Christians to stay anchored in Scripture, fostering unity rooted in sound doctrine. This unity is crucial, especially in today’s divided Church landscape where conflicting teachings abound. By grounding our beliefs in the Bible and focusing on Christ’s unifying work, we can maintain a clear and powerful witness in our communities.

#GodsPlanYourPart #Ephesians2 #GraceAndUnity #SpiritualTransformation #ChristTheCornerstone #BiblicalDoctrine #OneBodyInChrist #UnityInTheChurch #GodsSovereignPlan #ChristianCommunity

Transcript

 Ephesians 2

Ephesians 2

[00:00:00] Hey everyone, welcome to God's plan. Your part year two, where this year we're reading through and studying the entire new Testament one chapter at a time. Thanks again for joining us in discovering God's plan and your part in it. Today, we were looking at Ephesians chapter two. It's probably one of my favorite chapters in the Bible and Paul's just continuing.

Um, this case that he's making that we are unified in Christ. Remember, he's trying to teach this body of believers how to be even more healthy than they are and help them overcome all the radical differences that are present, uh, within this early church. So he's going to focus on the unity that is available in Christ.

And when you know that. And you can see this like intricate case that he's weaving, uh, starting in chapter one and now it's very present in chapter two. I do like the mention in verse three, um, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh. So I like that he references all [00:01:00] instead of just one group of people.

Um, so he's even signifying that there's unity, even though in the past it was like Israel's under the law. Like Gentiles, I guess they would be two, however, it just, it felt like there was much more of a distinction. And then I also really like how he is also bringing in Jesus and how Jesus is, again, a unifier and, I guess, ultimately, just like, a commonality between everyone.

It's interesting. He starts from the very top. And you were dead in the trespasses in sins in which 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. He's basically saying like you were following Satan.

And what's interesting is. He's talking to a very diverse group of people. There are, there are most likely Jews present. There are most likely Gentiles present. There are people who took their faith fairly seriously. There are people who did not take their faith seriously at [00:02:00] all. And he's making the case that, listen, all of you were dead in your sins and in your trespasses.

So there, the, the first unifying factor for everybody present is. You're all dead in your sins. Yeah, that's why I like that word all. Yes. Like it does, it includes everyone. So. Because he does mention the covenant and he does mention those things and it, I think, is helpful for people that are just coming in.

This is super interesting because, uh, lately I've been engaging in some comments on the YouTubes, um, with folks that are trying to make the case that Only Jews were under the law and only Jews needed redemption. Uh, I was not super familiar with this argument. This is a new one for me. Uh, if you're, if you're out there and you've heard this before, let me know what you think about it.

Um, but it's, it's very obvious here in Ephesians chapter two, that Paul's making the case that everyone is guilty of sin because all of us were by nature, um, following the Prince of the power of the air and children of wrath. Everybody. And so it's, [00:03:00] it's. Not really possible to make an honest case from the full context of the Bible that a small subset of humanity is under the law and therefore in need of a redemption and the rest of us are just fine.

Uh, Paul's constantly teaching that. All of us are under sin. Yes, the law is unique. Yes, those who were brought up under the law have a unique relationship with the law and with God. Um, but even more than the mosaic law, all of us are under the law of sin and death, and all of us need to be redeemed, uh, by Christ and the sacrifice that he made, the blood that he poured out for us so that we can have salvation and right.

Relationship with God, I do think it's interesting to there's reference to Adam, um, in verse 15, which would, I guess, also somewhat debunk that as well. The idea of the only people that are, and this was interesting. Usually when you are fiercely committed to false teaching, [00:04:00] like you're like hyper focused on one small verse instead of like this broader picture that's being painted.

Well, I was trying to say in that verse, it does, it's, it's referring to Jesus. Uh, Jesus is abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two. So making peace and might reconcile us both to God and body on the, through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

So I think that's interesting because the race before that went, it, it references all the way back to the first man, which is Adam, which would have been before the Mosaic law in the first place anyway. So I think that is. Telling. And Adam did not have the Mosaic Law, and yet Adam was held accountable for his sin.

His sin was just going against the commandments of God, going against the nature of God. Um, even Adam's son Cain and, and, um, Abel, like Cain was held responsible. Responsible for his sin against God, uh, for killing his brother, even though there was no mosaic law. [00:05:00] So all of us are under sin. All of us are deserving of death.

And I heard a pastor say, um, and this is somewhat tongue in cheek and maybe not. Totally appropriate. But I've heard a pastor say that verse four Ephesians chapter two, verse four is the biggest, but in all the Bible, and he just liked to make those jokes. Um, but it, it basically like pausing out this case that we are all under sin and death, we are all deserving of wrath.

Um, actually he says what, um, carrying out the desires of a body in the mind and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind, but God being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses made us alive together with Christ again, remember he's trying to unifying, unify this incredibly diverse group of believers.

And so he's saying, Hey, all of you were dead in your sins, regardless of where you came from. Amen. And God intervened on your behalf and gave you grace that you did not deserve, regardless of your background, all [00:06:00] of you have been saved through faith by the grace of God. It's a free gift. So it's even today, very unifying to know that, like, I don't deserve the grace that I've been given.

God intervened on my behalf because he loves me and cares for me. And while I was still a sinner, gave his life for me. Verse 10 stuck out to me as well. I know we're kind of jumping all over the place. We are a little bit. Sorry, guys. But it is worth noting, I guess. Verse 10 says, For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which he prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.

And I think, like, it all seems like kind of separated on this weird timeline. But it's all been for known Mm-Hmm, . And it's, it's all that, that semi predestination conversation we were having yesterday. That's what really kind of sticks out to me. But God was going to send Jesus ultimately. That's always been part of the plan and we were always included in that.

Yes. From the beginning. From the very beginning, which is very [00:07:00] interesting. And just kind of pulling in yesterday's but also. I guess wrapping my head around it is a little bit like, whoa, if you haven't had a chance to listen to yesterday's episode, go check it out. And, and even more than that, just go read Ephesians chapter one.

Like, it's more important that you hear what God has to say than what we have to say. Um, but Ephesians one lays out that there is this. predestination at work and that God has chosen people beforehand. Now, Paul's pointing out the fact that not only has God chosen people for himself, he has designed good works that they are meant to walk in.

This is still applicable to us today. So God has chosen people for himself and he has planned for those people to walk. Um, in good works, uh, before the foundations of the world. So again, we talked about this yesterday. This can be a very controversial thing. It is very clear that the Bible teaches in several different instances, not just in Ephesians, um, that God has chosen people for himself and he raises up people for himself, fun, fun, [00:08:00] little exercise.

Think of. Any character in the Bible that chose on their own to follow God. It's very difficult to do. And I do challenge you. Like if you have hesitations about, um, predestination, um, think through that exercise. Cause we've done that before you and I, cause you've had hesitations with that before. Abraham, no, it's, it's really interesting.

Like the many, many characters in the Bible, like God kind of just shows up and calls people to himself. I mean, literally Paul writing this, like he did not choose to follow God. Uh, God chose him. And so Paul's just being in this case that like, not only has God chosen you, he has chosen good works for you to walk in.

Um, and again, I'll just, I'll just say this. For the sake of doing justice to this, the Bible is much less clear on if God has chosen people for damnation. And that is often what people get really worked up about because they're like, well, if God chose people for himself, then he must've [00:09:00] chosen people to be destroyed.

The, I don't believe the Bible teaches that if it does point it out to me so I can see it and then I can learn. Um, but it does appear that everybody gets a choice. Uh, everybody has an opportunity to, to, to choose Christ and to, to, you know, Uh, except salvation, it's a free gift to humanity. Um, and at the same time, God has chosen people for himself beforehand.

So it's, it's this difficult thing to hold intention, uh, but it is being taught here in Ephesians two. I think overall, cause I was kind of like, wait a minute, where are we going with this? Um, but this unity piece, this piece of Jesus coming to unify us in this way is helpful because again, this whole letter is trying to Bring these people together.

That's exactly it. And I don't even think just these people. The last verse of, actually last like two verses of the chapter, are really talking about just the church in general. Mm hmm. And I think that is very important as well because this is not just your own little personal church that you go to [00:10:00] where we all need to be unified.

It's across the board church, like the whole big shebang. And I think it's really important to recognize that because it's so easy to be so isolated and focused on like your tiny little thing that you're working on. Um, but working together as a body of the whole church, what are we doing to stay unified in that way?

Because I'll tell you what, recently we've been to, you know, just like several places or just even listening to, listening to pastors. It's like, wow. There was one instance where I had listened to a sermon and I was like, very, like pretty confused. But then I listened to another sermon where it was like, that pastor just like literally preached the opposite of what the, I just heard the other pastor.

So there is a, there's a, there's unity on so many levels, but I think Like, even just that to me was like, wow, there's clearly like lines in the sand where it's like, you're doing what you're doing and you're doing what you're [00:11:00] doing. And I guess we're just happy in our own little camps. You know what I mean?

I think that's really important. Um, the, the vast difference. Cross Christianity is not always a super positive thing. Um, the fact that you can be committed to one church and they might say something or teach something that frustrates you slightly, and you can just go down the street and find a different church that teaches something entirely different is not helpful.

And it's, it's. It's just not great. Um, and, and one of the things that has been a problem is that, um, there are so many vast differences in doctrine across the board and it is not always helpful. And so one of the best things I think, obviously Jenny and I are not going to solve this problem. Uh, it would be nice if we could, but we can't.

Um, one of the, one of the best things we can do is be Anchored in scripture because scripture is revealing to us what proper doctrine is. I think that was a big problem. Like some of the things I was listening to was like, [00:12:00] okay, there's not a whole lot of like foundational biblical text here. So it's pretty easy when we like are like, well, listening to this person's like thoughts and opinions, a whole hour of it is going to be very different from someone else's whole hour of thoughts and opinions.

So it's when, when your messages and when your, um, philosophy of ministry is not driven by things revealed clearly in the Bible. In context, you are setting yourself up for silliness and muddiness and perhaps in the worst scenarios, complete false teaching. And that was what happened to us when we were just listening to different sermons.

Um, it's. It's pretty easy to preach something that's not entirely true when you just cherry pick verses across the Bible instead of teaching things in their proper context and within their general narrative. So, um, yeah, you know, I don't mind being on the record saying like the, the, the incredible differences in [00:13:00] doctrine across Christianity is not a great thing.

Um, and you can see here that, that. Paul, I mean, we, we've read, um, we've read first Corinthians, we've read Galatians. We're now reading Ephesians. You can see that he's teaching very similar things across the board. And yes, he's trying to achieve unity within the Ephesian church, but even bigger than that, he's trying to achieve unity across all of the churches so that all of these new believing Christians understand who Jesus is, understand what salvation is, understand how to live out their new faith.

In their communities. And when we are sharp in our doctrine and we're rooted in scripture and led by the Holy spirit, we're in a much stronger position to be able to be unified. Um, cause it's very hard to be unified when we don't even believe that the same things about how to handle things in culture.

And you can point to any, you know, And the list of hot cultural topics. And you know, if, if you've been in Christianity for very long, uh, it's very easy to know that there are extreme differences in your own [00:14:00] communities. Um, you know, one church on the corner can be preaching one thing and saying something is sinful.

Another church down the street might be saying it's not sinful at all. And that's not a positive thing. And the only way to avoid it is to really dig into what's being revealed in scripture. Um, that, that is quite a tangent and perhaps a soapbox. Um, but I think it calls it out here at the end of the chapter.

I think that's where I kind of fell on, like, okay, we need to have unity within the body. And I think it really does, like you were saying, start with. Understanding what the Bible actually says. Uh, I went back a little bit further. It even starts in like verse 19. So you're no longer strangers and aliens, but your fellow citizens with the saints and the members of the household of God.

So like, that's a pretty big deal right there. And then it says built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets. Dang, like that's even more so. And then finally Christ himself is the cornerstone in whom the whole structure being joined together, [00:15:00] So, this idea of this structure, like, it's so many pieces, and we have a responsibility to be unified and work together.

Because of all these things that are working together to be the body of Christ across history, across time, like it's, it's so crazy. It's, it's actually like such a cool thing to be a part of, but it's interesting how we can be so willy nilly about what we're getting split up about. Think about how powerful it is when he says that we are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the spirit.

And just before that, he says that we've been grown into a holy temple in the Lord. Like, like the temple was a. Big deal. And he's saying now the gathered body of believers is the temple. It's the dwelling place of God. So you need to be a part of that gathered body of believers. This is not something that you do on your own.

You do it gathered with other folks and you commit to those other folks. Um, I can, can I just add something to that? [00:16:00] Our study Bible does say this, and I'm not saying this is like truth. Cause it's just a little. Like added understanding of it. Uh, it says, as you are joined together as God's holy temple, it says belonging to the visible church is not optional for followers of Christ.

Like you have to be a part of the body. And I think that is, that can be really tricky for people sometimes. It's been really tricky for us. Yeah. And so I think that's something else that's really important because you can't just do it on your own. I mean, that's the whole idea of like the whole body and like, the body can't function on its own as one arm or one eye or whatever.

So, and just because it's tricky doesn't mean you shouldn't do it. Like there are challenges. Obviously, when you have a gathered group of people, there are challenges and that I guess to bring it all together, that's what Paul's trying to do, even in this letter to the Ephesians is there were challenges and the people came from extremely diverse backgrounds and saw things differently.

And what he's trying to do is unify them in And understanding who Jesus is, understanding how salvation has been achieved for all of them, regardless of their [00:17:00] background and understand that they need to be unified to bring glory to God, to do what God has called them to do. That was true for the Ephesian church.

That is true for today's Christian church and are your part is to encourage you to be committed. To your church and to, to really be like expressing your gifts and talents and building up that body of believers so that your Christian witness in your community is strong and effective. Do everything you can to bring unity to that body be united in Christ as Paul says.

Um, being built together into a dwelling place for God by the spirit. That is no small task, but it is something that God does and we are obedient to him. So we'll be back again tomorrow, looking at Ephesians chapter three. We'll see you then. Thanks for joining today's episode of God's plan. Your part, as always, please consider partnering with us as we are a listener supported podcast that we hope to continue to grow with.

just like you. We've made it super easy to partner with us [00:18:00] and you can support us by following the link in our show notes or our description. You can support us with as little as 3 a month. Every little bit of this helps so much and we're so thankful for your support. With that in mind. Here's today's reading.

Ephesians chapter 2. And you were dead in trespasses, in 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, 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.

But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you have been saved, and raised us up with him and seated us with him into heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable [00:19:00] riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God, not a result of good works so that no one may boast for we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Therefore, remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands.

Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers. to the covenant of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing the [00:20:00] law of the commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

And he came and preached peace to you who were far off, and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens. But you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord.

In him. You also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the spirit. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of God's plan, your part. Don't forget. You can find us on just about every social media platform and YouTube. Let [00:21:00] us know what you thought of today's episode. And if you have any questions, go ahead and post them there.

You can also reach out to us directly at God's plan. Your part at gmail. com as always. If you don't have a Bible, or if you'd like to use the one that we use, uh, reach out to us via email and we'll be happy to send one to you. Thanks again for listening. We'll see you again tomorrow.