Open your Bibles, if you will, to Ephesians chapter two. We are continuing our series of studies on the doctrine of salvation. We have seen redemption planned. We have seen redemption accomplished. We’ve tried to work through the various aspects of the death of Christ, the significance of his work and his resurrection. And we have moved now to redemption applied, where that redemptive work now is made ours in our personal experience. And I’ve been very eager to get to this wonderful subject today of saving grace.
Last time, we looked at the broader topic of common grace. Today, we look at this wonderful subject of saving grace. And we’re going to try to see this doctrine from Ephesians chapter two, verses one to 10:
And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of the world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works 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 of 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’ve been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. This is not your own doing; it’s the gift of God, not a result of 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.
Let’s bow together. Our Father, each time we approach your word together, we ask for your Spirit to enlighten our minds and our hearts. Give us minds to understand; give us hearts to receive. Help us, as this passage has intended, to glory in the greatness of your grace to us in Jesus Christ. May we come away from here worshiping you more than when we came in the recognition that you’ve been so good to us in Jesus Christ. We pray in his name. Amen.
Well, this, of course, is a marvelous passage of Scripture, one of the better-known passages in the New Testament because of it. And just again, a brief overview of the passage: verses 1 to 3. The Apostle Paul here gives us a brief summary of our condition and our state before we were saved. We were dead in trespasses and sins. We were following the prince of the power of the air, that’s Satan. We are sons of disobedience. We’re children of wrath, just like everyone else. That’s verses one to three: our state and condition before God came to us in salvation.
And then verses four to six, we have the great change that came about and the saving benefits that come because of God’s grace. He emphasizes it again: when we were dead, we were made alive, were raised together with Christ to life, and in fact seated with him in the heavenlies.
And verse 7 then gives God’s ultimate purpose in it all, just a marvelous verse. He has come to us in our spiritual death, under God’s wrath, deserving of punishment, running against him with all of our might, and yet he comes to us, makes us alive, raises us from the dead, seats us with Christ in the heavenlies, so that—notice the purpose clause, verse seven—so that… why did you do that? So that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. That is, God has an ultimate purpose in this, saving us by grace, and that is to show off his own glorious grace, and so that forever we will rejoice in it and praise him for the grace shown to us in Christ Jesus. That’s his goal: his own glory.
Verses 8 and 9 then give us a summary explanation of the passage. “For by grace you have been saved through faith. This is not of your own doing; it’s a gift of God, not a result of work, so that no one may boast.” So there’s the point he’s been driving to, to show us that salvation is by grace. For by grace you have been saved through faith.
And then verse 10, he says it one more time: “For we are his workmanship.” That is his workmanship. He is the one who has made us now what we are. “Created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” And there’s the note there of his predetermining grace. Long ages before, he had planned to bring us into Christ and to transform us in Christ so that we would have these transformed lives and walk accordingly.
So Paul’s purpose here in these verses is to express the blessings of salvation. You will remember in chapter one, Paul starts out with this note of praising God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ. He outlines those blessings for us in chapter one, verses three to 14: blessings from the Father, from the Son, from the Spirit; blessings of salvation, the past in his electing grace, and the present in Christ’s work, and in the sending of the Spirit to us to seal us to Christ, and then blessings in the future. He has sealed us forever in Christ by his Spirit.
And throughout chapters 1, 2, and 3 here in Ephesians, Paul is simply outlining these great blessings that we have in Christ. It’s one reason that Ephesians has been such a favorite book of so many people, because it expounds at such length the great riches that we have in Jesus Christ. So he’s expounding the blessings that we have in salvation, the greatness of God’s work in us, but he’s doing that, it seems, just so that we may glory in it. This is to minister to the hearts of God’s people that we will learn to rejoice in what God has done for us. His ultimate purpose is his own glory, but toward that end is our rejoicing in the grace that we have experienced in Christ, and that’s verse 7.
So we have throughout chapter 2 now—throughout the whole actually, but in chapter 2 now verses 1 to 10—the focus is on this matter of the grace of God. This is the single explaining factor that accounts for the great change in our lives. Grace is what happened.
In verses 1 to 3, he tells us what we were. And what we were was lost. Dead in trespasses and sins, walking according to the course of this age, following Satan, children of wrath, disobedient. That’s what we were, verses 1 to 3. And then verses 4 to 7, he shifts gears and says, this is what God has done. And God has interrupted us in our walk in sin and has turned us around and brought about this great transformation. And the whole explaining factor for it is this word grace.
We have it in verse 5 already. He mentions it here just parenthetically before really getting into the point. We have a description of what we were in verses 1 to 3; verse 4, then we have this shift, “but God,” according to his great mercy; verse 5 now, “even when we were dead in trespasses and sins, made us alive together with Christ”—and then he just slips it in parenthetically—”by grace you’ve been saved.” That’s the point he’s getting to in verse eight, but he kind of can’t wait to say it. And so he slips it in parenthetically in verse five to emphasize: grace is what I’m talking about. This is what accounts for the great change that we have had in our own experience. So before really getting into it further, he has to say it in verse five; then verse eight, he gets to the point that he’s been wanting to stress.
In verse eight, “for”—the explanatory conjunction there, he’s telling you why he’s been, God has been doing this, how it all came—”For by grace you have been saved through faith. This is not of your own doing; it’s a gift of God.” Verse nine, “it’s not a result of your works, so that”—there’s another purpose clause—”so that no one will boast.” He is saving in such a way that no one can brag about it, except as they boast in the Lord. And then verse 10, one more time, “For we are his workmanship,” not ours, “his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared that we would walk in them” long ago. So he wants us to see and to recognize that our salvation is all of grace.
What I want to do then for this hour today is look at these verses here, which are devoted to this doctrine of grace. And now that we’ve surveyed it, go back and see what does this passage have to tell us about grace? What is grace? What is the doctrine of grace and how does this passage inform it for us?
I’m sure you’re familiar with many of the popular definitions that we have of grace. One is, I think most of us learned when we were young, “unmerited favor.” It’s a good definition: unmerited favor. I’ll want to add to that a little bit as we go, but that’s a good definition. Others have taken grace, the English word grace, and made it an acronym: “God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense.” That’s a good definition of grace. Others have spoken of grace as God’s favor to the guilty, God’s love to the unlovely, the unloving, the hateful, and the hating. Others have spoken of grace as God’s kindness to rebels, God’s generosity to his enemies. All of that helps us, I think, very well get to the idea of what grace is.
Let’s look at the vocabulary that Paul uses here in chapter two. Verse four: “God who is rich in mercy.” Not just merciful, but rich in mercy. “Because of the great love with which he loved us.” That is, this is not just like any other kind of love you have seen. This is a great love. So grace has the character of love. Or, I think better, say it the other way: love from God to sinners necessarily has the character of grace. It is undeserved, and God is rich in that kind of mercy, and his love is a great kind of love.
Then verse five, we have the word grace. “By grace you have been saved.” Verse seven: “so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” So here’s the word grace again, but it’s an immeasurable riches of grace that he has. So whatever grace is, it’s a lot. That’s the idea. And then in “his kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” So all of this terminology he’s piling up to give us a sense of what grace is. Grace is mercy. It is a richness of mercy to us. It is a love. It is a greatness of love. It’s a grace. It’s the immeasurable riches of grace. It’s kindness. And then verse nine, it is a gift.
So he’s explaining salvation entirely in terms of grace. Again, that’s the explanation that he gives in verse eight: “for by grace you’ve been saved.” It’s a gift of God. Verse nine, not a result of works, so that—precisely so that—no one can boast about it. Verse 10, we are his workmanship; he has prepared us for the good works that we have now. So grace is divine favor, and Paul is emphasizing that this is the sole source of salvation. Last time we saw God’s common grace, his loving benevolence toward all of his creation, even rebel sinners generally. Now we look at this matter of saving grace, special grace of God exerted to rescue and restore sinners to life in Christ.
Now, what are some of the essential ideas, then, of grace? Again, we’re pulling from this passage a theology of grace. What can we learn here?
Grace Is Favor
Number one, grace is favor. That’s just basic. We’ve already seen that. Grace is favor. It is benevolence. It is mercy. It is love. It is kindness. It is a gift. Pick your word here. Grace is God’s favor.
Grace Is Power
Number two, grace is not just a disposition on God’s part, a favorable disposition, but we find in this passage that grace is power. Grace is action on God’s part. It’s not just a favorable disposition. Grace is God’s favor in action. We see that in verses five and following, that in grace, when we were dead—when we were dead, and walking the other way, and in rebellion against God, and children of disobedience, and children of wrath, when all of that—when we were dead, God made us alive. He raised us. He seated us in the heavenly places. Verse 8, he saved us.
Grace is not just a disposition on God’s part; it is God’s favorable disposition in action by which he comes to us in rescue, makes us alive in Christ, raises us together with Christ, seats us in the heavenlies in Christ, and saves us. Grace is the power of God at work in converting the soul and bringing us to life and to faith. That’s the contrast here, even in terms of our outward behavior. In verse one, we have the description of how we behaved before, and the terminology of walking is used there. We walked according to the course of this world, following Satan. But then when we get to verse 10, as a result of the grace of God, we now have a different walk. We walk in good works. And the whole explaining factor for it is this matter of grace. God in grace has come and made us alive in Christ, and he’s raised us together with him, seated us in the heavenlies in Christ, and saved us. And it has resulted in a change of behavior on our part.
Grace is God’s favor. Grace is God’s favor in action. It is God’s power at work in us. We find this often in the New Testament. For those of you who would like, you can jot down some other passages in this regard. In Romans 6 verse 14, because we are now under grace, we no longer are enslaved to sin. Paul says in Romans 6:14, “sin no longer has dominion over you.” You might remember in Romans chapter six, we’ve got these two realms of existence: under law or under sin (the same) and under grace. And under law and under sin, it’s a dominion in which we live. We can’t break its grip. Under grace, that sin’s grip is broken, and we’ve been liberated, and he says sin no longer has dominion over you. It has the connotations of effectual grace, God at work in us.
In 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 10, Paul says, “by the grace of God, I am what I am.” Again, it speaks of God’s grace as power. God’s favor, yes, but it’s his favor in action. God at work in us. When Paul gives his famous benediction in 2 Corinthians 13 and verse 14, “the grace of God be with you.” What does that mean? The grace of God be with you. It reflects this idea of grace as God’s favor in action. God being with us in the sense of enablement and encouragement in producing the fruit of righteousness.
So grace is not just God’s favorable disposition. It is God’s favor in action. And that, according to verses one to three, is just what our condition requires. What we need is not for God simply to have a favorable disposition. We need God to do a work. And grace is both the favorable disposition of God and it is God at work. A couple of weeks ago, you might remember—or some weeks ago, whenever it was the last one—we mentioned that grace is not a thing. But grace, in terms of saving grace, very simply is Christ—God at work through us through Christ. Christ securing for us God’s favor and God’s action in us. And when Paul says, “the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you,” it’s not a thing; it’s not an impersonal force. It is the work of Christ in us by his Spirit, enabling us.
Grace Is God’s Favor And Power To The Ill-Deserving
Number three, grace is God’s favor and power to the ill-deserving. And I want to stress this. Grace is God’s favor and action and his power to the ill-deserving. That’s verses 1 to 3. We’re dead in trespasses and sins. We’re following Satan. We’re disobedient. We’re children of wrath. And yet, verse 4, “but God, who’s rich in mercy, even with his great love with which he loved us. When we were dead, made us alive together with Christ.”
Now this point here is not an insignificant detail. Grace is God’s favor in action to the ill-deserving. And I say it that way—not just the undeserving, but to the ill-deserving. I want to stress that. It’s essential to an understanding of grace. Grace presupposes guilt. It presupposes sin. It presupposes ill-desert. It’s not that we’re some neutral party who has no specific claim on grace, but it is, in fact, God’s favor expressed toward and working in those who deserve condemnation because of their sin against him. And we don’t fully appreciate grace until we see it in that context, and I’m sure that’s why Paul begins where he does in verses 1 to 3.
We Calvinists have often been accused of calling sinners worms and making people miserable in their sins. And there’s something about that that you have to see in the New Testament. And it’s not—it is not that we have some kind of a sadistic desire to make people feel miserable about themselves. But like Paul here in Ephesians 2, you cannot—you cannot appreciate grace until you see the depths of sin, the depths of guilt, and the ill-desert that we have before a holy God, and then he has come to us in our spiritual ill-desert, and instead of in judgment, he gives us mercy and kindness.
It’s one thing to show favor to those who deserve it. It’s another thing, perhaps, to show grace to people who are just unknown, neutral. But the distinguishing mark of God’s grace is that it’s not just unmerited favor. It’s ill-merited favor. It’s not enough to say that I didn’t deserve it. We have to go further and say what I did deserve was judgment at God’s hand.
So grace is God’s favor. It is God’s power and action. It is God’s favor and power to the ill-deserving. And all of that to say, I’m still working on this third point, that grace is free. Grace is free. And what I mean by that is that it’s unconstrained. God is not under obligation. There’s no necessity on God’s part to give it. This is ill-merited favor. And so by the nature of the case, if this grace is given, it’s given freely. No one can lay a claim on it. Never been a moment in the history of mankind where God was obligated to show favor to sinners. Grace is free. It’s a gift given apart from any consideration in us. God doesn’t look at us and say, well, here’s a man who’s not as bad as others. Here’s one whose heart is a little bit more willing. Here’s one with more potential. Grace is given apart from any consideration in us. God is always and in every case free to give or withhold. He’s unobliged. That’s just the nature of the case given verses 1 to 3. God’s grace is to the ill-deserving and therefore it is free. And there’s no explaining verses 1 to 3 in contrast to verse 4 and following apart from that.
Now, the theological term that’s been used for this is that God’s grace is prevenient. That is, it goes before. It’s an expression that reaches back to Augustine, 5th century. God’s grace necessarily takes the initiative. It goes before. We have that in this passage. Verses 1 to 3, we were dead. We were walking according to the course of this world; by nature, children of wrath, children of disobedience. We were going the other way. And then those first two words of verse four, that tells the whole story: “But God.”
Now those of you who have the NIV, the translation is fine, but it misses, in my judgment, it misses the starkness of the contrast that we have here. The wording in the original is, “but God,” and you’re struck with this contrast. I think the NIV is, “but, because of his great love with which he loved us, God,” and it goes on something like that, which is a fine translation. There’s nothing particularly wrong with that, except that it misses the starkness of the contrast that we have here. But God—you are dead, you are running the other way, but God. And the whole explanation is that God intervened in our mad rush to hell. And left to ourselves, we would still be dead in our trespasses and sins and children of disobedience and walking according to the course of this world. But God, verse four, but God stepped in and he made the difference. And verse five, he then made us alive and he raised us together with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenlies.
Now all of that is to stress this point that grace is free. Grace takes the initiative. It’s prevenient. It goes ahead and goes before. And if God had not taken the initial step, we would still be lost. Salvation is not something that any of us has attained from anything on our side. God has not come to us conditioned upon something that we have done or that we have felt or that we have thought. But we were dead and we were running the other way. And the whole change is because God had different plans for us than we did. In favor and in grace, immeasurable kindness and riches of grace, he took a rebel sinner and interrupts him in his mad rush to condemnation and turns him around, joins him to Christ, raises him to a new life, and changes his entire existence.
I’ve mentioned that Augustine is the one who gave this terminology of prevenient grace. There’s actually a—Arminians have picked up that term themselves, particularly since Wesley, and they’ve used it in another way to say that God—they recognize the universal depravity, but God has in grace, prevenient grace, gone ahead and rescued everyone from that and lifted us to this ability now to turn to God ourselves and leaves the critical moment and the deciding factor to us. And that’s prevenient grace, according to Wesleyan Arminians. That does not fit with verses 1 to 3 and then verses 4 and following. The whole point is that God took the initiative and that left to ourselves, we would still be running against him.
And all of that is to say then that the relationship of grace and salvation is that of cause and effect. And we have these expressions in the New Testament—by grace, in grace, through grace—and you’ll see them all through the New Testament. And let me give you a listing of some of them. Salvation finds its origin and its source not in us, but in God’s grace. Romans 3:24, we are justified by grace. Romans 11:5, we are chosen by grace. 1 Corinthians 15:10, I am what I am by the grace of God. 2 Corinthians 8 and verse 9, we are rescued and restored by grace. Colossians 1 verses 6 and 15, we are called by grace. Ephesians 1 here in verses 5 and 6, we’re predestined to the praise of his glorious grace which came ahead. Ephesians 1 verse 7, we’re redeemed and forgiven according to the riches of his grace. Ephesians 3 verse 7, Paul says he was made a minister of this gospel according to the gift of God’s grace. 2 Thessalonians 2:16, we are given comfort and good hope through grace. 2 Timothy 1:9, saved us and called us, not because of our own purpose, but because of his own purpose and grace. Titus 2:11, the grace of God brings salvation. Titus 3:7, justified by his grace, and on and on it goes.
The whole point of this is to say that salvation finds its source and origin in nothing about us, but in God’s kindness given to us. Whether we speak in terms of our election and predestination, our redemption, our calling, our regeneration, our faith, our sanctification, our adoption, all of it finds its source in God’s grace. And in fact, I probably should address one question I’m sure many of you have been aware of in verses eight and nine here. Even our faith is of grace.
There’s been some discussion and debate on this in verses 8 and 9. “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not of your own doing.” The question is, what does the “this” refer to? For by grace you’ve been saved through faith, and this is not of your own doing. Does it refer to salvation, grace, faith, salvation entirely? Does it have reference to faith itself? We want to say it refers to the faith at least, if not—that’s the closest antecedent to it—if not to the whole package of salvation, grace, faith. Arminians like to argue back that the word “this,” the demonstrative pronoun “this,” is neuter. Faith is a feminine noun, and you can’t have that. And in fact, you can. In ancient Greek, a neuter pronoun could refer often to an abstract noun of another gender. It’s not unheard of, and I think that’s Paul’s point here. That by grace you have been saved through faith, and even that faith is not of your own doing. We have that confirmed elsewhere even if it’s not here. Acts chapter 18 verse 27: we believe through grace. Philippians chapter 1: it’s been given to us to believe. Faith itself even is a gift of God.
God wants us to recognize that our salvation in all of its dimensions is entirely from his side. And why is that so important? Verse nine. It’s important for us to recognize that salvation is by pure grace so that no one will boast. God will not have it. He will not save in such a way that he has to share his glory with others. He saves in such a way that only he receives the glory for it. So that we will say, not just “to God be the glory,” but “to God alone be the glory.” And that’s not just verse 9. That’s verse 7, isn’t it? That’s God’s ultimate purpose. He wants for all of the endless ages of eternity to have us on display as trophies of His grace and His kindness to us. So that through all of eternity, there we are as trophies of His grace. And there won’t be anyone there saying, “Well, at least I…” every last one of us will be saying, “Look what He did.”
I don’t like to preach against brothers and sisters in Christ who hold doctrines that are contrary. I don’t like to make a habit of that. But here is a place where I should point out that this is the root, perhaps the root problem, or maybe say the true horror of Arminian theology. And in the end, it robs God of glory that belongs to him alone. I know we have brothers and sisters who are Arminians. I don’t want to deny that at all; I’m eager to affirm it. But I want to recognize that the implications of the theology robs God of glory that is his alone. God saves in such a way that only he receives the glory for it.
Now let’s spend some time on application for this. Why is this important for me to know? Why is this important for you to know? Why is it important for Christians to have an understanding of the doctrine of saving grace?
And I’ll start in terms of personal experience in conversion. When we are first brought to recognize our sin and our ill-desert, what we want most of all at that point to know is that salvation is free. The whole reason we came to Christ in the first place is because we sensed our own lostness, our helplessness, and our ill-desert, and we heard that salvation is free. And if salvation is free, we qualify. Grace is what makes the gospel good news. And apart from this notion of grace, there is no good news in it. When God first opened our eyes to our sin, we saw our guilt and our condemnation. We sensed it before God. The first thing we did, to use Jesus’ words, the first thing we did is we ran to Jesus like little children, owning our utter helplessness and going to Him to do for us what we could never have done for ourselves. If anything else had been required, it would not have been good news at all.
Second, having come to Christ, it’s liberating to know that because salvation is by grace, we have not incurred a debt. Because salvation is by grace, it’s liberating to know we have not incurred a debt. Grace by the nature of it is free. It is without obligation. Salvation doesn’t incur a debt that must be repaid. God doesn’t come to us and say, “Okay, I’ve saved you, but now you have to make it up to me or else.” It’s grace. It’s free. And we may sing songs like what I consider one of the greatest hymns ever written—I’d love to learn it here—”A Debtor to Mercy Alone.” Or “but drops of grief can ne’er repay the debt of love I owe.” We may sing of debt in that sense, but we must remember it’s just a poetic way of saying that God has done it all. We owe it all to him. It all comes from his side. And this doctrine of grace—and this is why Paul has given it to us here in the context of Ephesians—this doctrine of grace is meant to be reveled in. It’s meant for us to enjoy the freeness of our salvation. That’s what Paul means when he writes to the Galatians: “For freedom,” he says—listen to that—”For freedom, Christ has set us free.” Why has he set us free? For freedom, that’s why. Enjoy it. Don’t be entangled again to a yoke of bondage. This is bound up with Paul’s command, the repeated command of the Philippians: “Rejoice in the Lord.” We are meant to revel in the fact that God has done it all, and none of it has reference at all to what we have deserved. It’s entirely his.
It’s important for us to know also, thirdly, because it’s essential to our assurance. If salvation were dependent upon me in any way, well then it’d be easy to see how it might become lost. But we do not fully appreciate how fundamentally opposed grace is to merit until we recognize that just as salvation cannot be merited—hear it—just as salvation cannot be merited, so it cannot be demerited. It’s grace. When we sin, grace, just because it’s grace, is not sinned away. Grace is favor to the ill-deserving. I didn’t obtain salvation because I merited it. Salvation does not continue because I merit it. Salvation is not discontinued because I’ve demerited it. It’s grace. That’s a good thing or none of us would last. If it were not that free, salvation would just be an idea; it’d have no meaning. There is such a thing as apostasy. But it always in the Bible is the mark of a spurious faith. Those who are genuinely saved are kept by the power of God through faith. Grace is free. It is wholly independent of human merit. It has no reference whatever to what I deserve. No reference whatever to what I deserve. It’s merely according to God’s goodness. Every day of my life, I want to know that my standing before God is in grace. That my salvation, that first day, and that second day, and that third day, and the fourth day, and the fifth day, and every day since has no reference whatever to what I deserve. It has reference to what God has done in mercy and in kindness to a sinner.
Why is it important that we know this? One, so that we will worship God as we ought. Verse 7, and for all eternity acknowledge Him as the one who’s done it all. And why else? Well, it’s important for us to know for the sake of our own assurance and joy. So we’ll revel in this, that God has given us such grace and mercy in saving us all from His own side. Amen.
Let’s pray. Our Father,