A.03 Eph_2:1-22

Ephesians 2:1-22
Ephesians 1:1-23 ends by speaking of the church as Christ's body, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all; Ephesians 2:1-22 shows us the materials of which the church is composed. Ephesians 2:1-22 differs greatly from Ephesians 1:1-23 in its general bearing; for Ephesians 1:1-23 brings God forward, and shows us what He counselled before the world was, scarcely touching upon the condition in which He found His elect; while Ephesians 2:1-22 gives prominence to what we were, and details our low estate. Here we are bidden to look down; in the preceding chapter we are called to look up.
In speaking of our former condition the Spirit impresses a line of truth different from that in Romans. There the sinner is viewed as living in his sins — here as dead, "dead in trespasses and in sins." In Romans, I needed to be put to death, and I am shown my death with Christ; in Ephesians I am viewed as dead, and now quickened together with Him. What more striking picture could the Spirit draw of our former state of corruption and helplessness? What can come forth from the dead but corruption? and where can the dead find help but in God Himself? Yet was it an active kind of death; for we "walked according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience." The devil rules all in the world; his influence is all-pervading, and we were once under his power as all others. Another Spirit works in us now through grace. The enemy is called "the prince of the power of the air" here only; and this is quite in accord with the general character of this Epistle, which is occupied with the heavenlies. In 1 Peter he is spoken of as "a roaring lion," and characteristically; for saints are there viewed as strangers and pilgrims passing through the wilderness, and it is in the wilderness we find the lion.
Up to this point the apostle had said "ye," meaning the Gentiles to whom he was writing; but were the Jews better as to their former state? "Among whom also we* all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath even as others" (Ephesians 2:3). The Jew, with all his privileges and favours, was not one whit better than the outside Gentile. There may be outward differences, but before God the ruin is complete. The desires of the flesh may be distinct from those of the mind; but both spring from the one evil source. The former would comprehend all that is base and foul; the latter, man's search after wisdom, which invariably leads him from God, and lands him in self-complacency, vanity, and infidelity. Solemn thought! we ever should have delighted in and performed the will of God; but we loved not His way, preferring our own and indulging our "desires" (or "wills") to the full. The opposite should be true now; His will, not our own, should be our unceasing delight. Christ as Man below never did His own will, but the will of His Father, and we are called to follow His steps. All this was our state by nature; we were then "children of wrath even as others."
*In chap. Ephesians 1:12-13, there is a corresponding contrast of "ye" (Gentiles) and "we" (Jews), and of much interest too.
Where is hope to be found for the ruined? In God alone, and He is instantly brought in. His counsels were formed long before, irrespective of our nature and actings; but the Spirit is careful to tell us what we were when grace wrought in us to give us a part in and with the Christ of God. Note the largeness of the expressions: "rich in mercy" — "great love" — "the exceeding riches of His grace." Is the language too strong? Not for the magnificent portion which is ours, through grace, in Christ above. He loved us too "when we were dead in sins" — the first movement came from above and not from below — "and hath quickened us together with Christ." Christ came down in grace to where we were; He found us in a state of death with sins upon us; He Himself went down into death bearing our sins in His own body on the tree. What else would have availed? But, having accomplished all, God has raised Him from among the dead, and He has gone up in the power of resurrection-life into the presence of His Father and God as the risen Man, Head of the new creation, where all is of God. And we have been quickened with the Christ — not merely quickened, but with Him. Quickening has always been true from the beginning for man — irrespective of dispensational differences — needs to be born again to enter into the kingdom of God; but association in life with Christ was not thus developed until He died and rose. Is not this what He alluded to in John 10:1-42? "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." For we are not only "born anew," which is true of saints in all dispensations, but are associated in life with the risen Christ. He is the accepted and beloved One in the presence of God; we are the same through grace. He lives evermore; and because He lives, we live also. We are brought right into the heavenlies — already across Jordan — and made to sit together in Him: not with Him yet, but in Him. To this wondrous display of grace, in bringing us into such an exalted position, God will point in the ages to come; the exceeding riches of His grace will be everlastingly told out in His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.
It is noticeable that we are reminded here again and again that all is of grace, "faith" being the means, and this not of ourselves: it is the gift of God. Can God sanction boasting in His presence? Nay; he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. And so will it be for ever.
Salvation is looked upon in Ephesians as an accomplished and present thing. In Php_2:12-13, and Romans 8:22-25, the believer is regarded as a pilgrim here below (as also in 1 Peter), beset with difficulties and dangers, and looking for salvation at the coming of the Lord Jesus. But this would not suit Ephesians, where we are viewed as blessed in the heavenlies. We have been and are saved. All is of God; it is His work alone. We were created in Christ Jesus for special good works (which God before prepared that we should walk in them).
The apostle has said that salvation is not of works but of grace, that none should boast; but in Ephesians 2:10 he shows that works hold an important place in Christianity. "Dead works" are as valueless, if not as outwardly offensive, as "wicked works"; but believers are "created in Christ Jesus, unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." It answers to justification before men, as James speaks, which is in no way a contradiction of the doctrine of Paul in Romans but its supplement.* How else is reality proved? Believers may speak of faith in Christ's name, and of association with Him on high; yet the "good works" convince of truth more than mere words. But how are such works produced? Not by following the law as a rule of life (the Galatians, who followed it, fell to biting and devouring each other), but by learning Christ in the power of the Holy Ghost. Believers have been created anew; and in the new creation law has no place.
*Many, not seeing this, have greatly slighted James' epistle. Luther described it as "a downright epistle of straw, with nothing evangelical about it." And a later countryman of his considers it a direct answer of Jewish Christianity to the Epistle to the Hebrews! The truth is, James furnishes us with the side of life, rather than Paul's doctrine of Christ's work, and nowhere writes anything contradictory to it.
How striking that the apostle should bid the saints to look down in Ephesians 2:11! We are carried very high in Ephesians 2:7, and shown our place as sitting in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus; we are now told to remember what we were. It is important to distinguish between self-occupation, and the remembrance of our ruined state. The former leads to doubt and fear; the latter to humility and deeper appreciation of grace.
The Ephesians, in their Gentile state, were called uncircumcision — a term of great reproach. (1 Samuel 14:6, 1 Samuel 31:4) . Circumcision was the sign of relationship with God (and more also): to be uncircumcised was to be altogether outside the circle of relationship and privilege. Consequently, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, they were apart from the Christ, having no hope, and without God in the world. All this is true of the Gentile: the Jew was outwardly nigh, had the promises, hoped in Christ Who should come, and had God's sanctuary and oracles. In the earlier part of the chapter the apostle lays down what is true of Jew and Gentile alike, here he emphasises what was particularly true of the Gentiles.
But where has Christ's work brought the believer? Into the Jew's old place of nearness to God? Nay, but into a place incomparably nearer than the Jew ever conceived. Moreover, He has brought the believing Jew into the same place, having abolished all distinctions after the flesh. This is an immense advance on all Old Testament teaching. The prophets spoke much of blessing for Gentiles, but always in a subordinate way to the Jew (all of which will be realised in the millennial reign). But meanwhile God has brought out His better thing, and Jew and Gentile, believing in Christ, are brought into the same blessed place of nearness to God: humbling to Jewish prejudice doubtless, but none the less the will of God. There are thus in this period three classes in the world: the Jews, the Gentiles, and the church of God (1 Corinthians 10:32). The Jew, believing in Jesus, is brought out of his old Jewish standing; and the Gentile from his place of distance: both are reconciled unto God in one body, and both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.
It is to be observed that God has "broken down" the wall which He Himself reared (it would have been sin for anyone else to have done so) of old. Jehovah said to His people, "I Jehovah am holy, and have severed you from other people that ye should be mine" (Leviticus 20:26). The godly gloried in this, and could say, "He showeth His word unto Jacob, His statutes and His judgments unto Israel. He hath not dealt so with any nation: and as for His judgments, they have not known them" (Psalms 147:19-20). So that Peter was warranted in telling Cornelius that it was an unlawful thing for a Jew to come unto, or keep company with, one of another nation. But such distinctions belong to the past. God's present work is the formation of the one body. Christ has abolished in His flesh the enmity (Ephesians 2:15). Peace is now proclaimed to the distant and to the nigh: and both draw near to the Father.
Therefore are we Gentiles no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God; and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone. Here we have a new thought; not merely one body, but a building. Formerly God sanctioned a material house, and dwelt in it in the midst of the people whom He had redeemed; but here we read of a temple of a very different order. The building on Moriah was disowned and empty ("your house is left unto you desolate" Matthew 23:38), and God was framing "a spiritual house" composed of living stones. Mark here it is God's building, not the work of man. We have to distinguish between the house as built by God, and as committed to human workmen. The first thought is to be found here, as well as in Matthew 16:1-28, and 1 Peter 2:1-25.
Viewed from this standpoint, all is perfect, as God's work ever is, and must be. The church against which the gates of hell cannot prevail is composed of living members, called and built by Christ Himself: no rubbish enters there. But how different when man's part is contemplated! In 1 Corinthians 3:1-23 Paul and His associates are viewed as builders in the house. Paul had laid a foundation at Corinth: others had followed, and built upon it. There the warning is found; for some may build wood, hay, and stubble (instead of gold, silver, and precious stones), and lose their reward in the coming day — all their work being consumed, while yet others may defile the temple of God, and be destroyed. The latter class are not Christians at all. God deals with men according to their profession; and all who take the ground of being His servants, whether possessing life or not, will be dealt with on that ground. (Compare Matthew 24:8-11; Matthew 25:30). Men build with doctrines: the faithful servant teaches the truth as revealed, and gathers true souls; the careless labourer, whose teaching is indifferent, gathers those who too often prove to be unreal, while the false servant corrupts the spring, and poisons and ruins all who fall under his baneful influence
In Ephesians 2:21 the temple is viewed as progressing; "it groweth unto a holy temple in the Lord." This would include every saint of this dispensation; and in this sense the temple is not completed until the Lord comes. "All the building" is the correct idea, not "each several building" as in R.V.* The latter rendering militates against the whole teaching of the epistle, which is the unity of the blessed in Christ.
*I notice that in Acts 2:36 — margin, the Revisers read "every house of Israel." This is at least consistent with their rendering of Ephesians 2:21; but the absurdity is very apparent.
In Ephesians 2:22, we get a further thought: "in whom also ye are builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit." Here we have, not the progressive thing, but the local thing — the gathered saints at Ephesus were God's habitation. Very similarly does the apostle speak to the Corinthians, "Know ye not that ye are God's temple, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you" (1 Corinthians 3:16)? Note the difference in the language in (1 Corinthians 6:19), where the saints are viewed individually. Precious, yet solemn, truth for saints to remember, that, as gathered, the Spirit of God is present making them His habitation. How widely and long this has been overlooked in Christendom, one scarcely need say, but it remains on the page of Scripture as the truth of God. Where believed, what room for human officers in worship, to say nothing of priests for us? Ministry or rule is another question.