True, but how do you know if you are really "in Christ"?
Eph 1:13 In Him you also who have heard the Word of Truth, the glad tidings (Gospel) of your salvation, and have believed in and adhered to and relied on Him, were stamped with the seal of the long-promised Holy Spirit.
Eph 1:14 That [Spirit] is the guarantee of our inheritance [the firstfruits, the pledge and foretaste, the down payment on our heritage], in anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring [complete] possession of it--to the praise of His glory.
AMPC
Eph 1:13 In Moshiach you also, having heard the message of HaEmes, the Besuras HaGeulah of Yeshu'at Eloheinu which is yours, having also come to emunah, received your chotam (seal) in Moshiach with the Ruach Hakodesh of havtachah (promise),
Eph 1:14 Who is bestowed as an eravon (pledge) of our nachalah (allotted inheritance, TEHILLIM 16:5-6), with a view to the Geulah of Hashem's own possession, to the tehilat kavod (praise of glory) of Him.
OJB
Ye were sealed (esphragisthēte). First aorist passive indicative of sphragizō, old verb, to set a seal on one as a mark or stamp, sometimes the marks of ownership or of worship of deities like stigmata (Gal_6:17). Marked and authenticated as God’s heritage as in Eph_4:30. See note on 2Co_1:22 for the very use of the metaphor here applied to the Holy Spirit even with the word arrabōn (earnest).
Spirit (pneumati). In the instrumental case.
Robertson
He begins by calling on all who know God to bless Him, that is, to bring joy to His heart by praise and worshiping love. The blessed One is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. At certain times Jesus addressed God as God (Mat_27:46). At other times He spoke of Him as Father (Joh_10:30). The blessed One is also the Blesser. We bless Him by praising Him. He blesses us and makes us glad by showering us with the riches of His grace.
He has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. Here is a pyramid of grace:
Blessing
spiritual blessing
every spiritual blessing
every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places
every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ
Notice first how unstinted are His heart and hand—every spiritual blessing. Notice, too, that these are spiritual blessings. The simplest way to explain this is to contrast them with the blessings of Israel under the law. In the OT, a faithful, obedient Jew was rewarded with long life, a large family, abundant crops, and protection from his enemies (Deu_28:2-8). The blessings of Christianity, in contrast, are spiritual, that is, they deal with treasures that are nonmaterial, invisible, and imperishable. It is true that the OT saints also enjoyed some spiritual blessings, but as we shall see, the Christian today enjoys blessings that were unknown in previous times.
Our blessings are in the heavenly places, literally “in the heavenlies.” Instead of being material blessings in earthly places, they are spiritual blessings in the heavenly places. The expression, in the heavenly places, is used five times in Ephesians:
Eph_1:3 — The sphere of our spiritual blessing
Eph_1:20 — The scene of Christ's present enthronement
Eph_2:6 — The scene of our present enthronement in Christ
Eph_3:10 — The locale from which angels witness God's wisdom exhibited in the church
Eph_6:12 — The region which is the source of our present conflict with evil spirits
When we put these passages together, we have a truly scriptural definition of the heavenly places. As Unger put it, they are “the realm of the believer's position and experience as a result of his being united to Christ by the baptism of the Spirit.” All spiritual blessings are in Christ. It was He who procured them for us through His finished work at Calvary. Now they are available through Him. Everything that God has for the believer is in the Lord Jesus. In order to receive the blessings, we must be united to Christ by faith. The moment a man is in Christ, he becomes the possessor of them all. Chafer writes, “To be in Christ, which is the portion of all who are saved, is to partake of all that Christ has done, all that He is, and all that He ever will be.”
In Christ is one of the key expressions of Ephesians. There are two closely related lines of truth in the NT—the truth of the believer's position and the truth of his practice.
First, the believer's position. Everyone in the world is either “in Adam” or “in Christ.” Those who are “in Adam” are in their sins and therefore condemned before God. There is nothing they can do in themselves to please God or gain His favor. They have no claim on God, and if they were to receive what they deserve, they would perish eternally.
When a person is converted, God no longer looks upon him as a condemned child of Adam. Rather He sees him as being in Christ, and He accepts him on that basis. It is important to see this. The believing sinner is not accepted because of what he is in himself, but because he is in Christ. When he is in Christ, he stands before God clothed in all the acceptability of Christ Himself. And he will enjoy God's favor and acceptance as long as Christ does, namely, forever.
The believer's position, then, is what he is in Christ. But there is another side to the picture—the believer's practice. This is what he is in himself. His position is perfect, but his practice is imperfect. Now God's will is that his practice should increasingly correspond to his position. It never will do so perfectly until he is in heaven. But the process of sanctification, growth, and increasing Christlikeness should be going on continually while he is here on earth.
Believers are perfect (Heb_10:14)
Believers should be perfect (Mat_5:48)
Believers are dead to sin (Rom_6:2)
Believers should reckon themselves dead to sin (Rom_6:11)
Believers are a holy nation (1Pe_2:9)
Believers should be holy (1Pe_1:15)
The first column deals with position, the second with practice.
Paul's Letter to the Ephesians itself is divided into two halves that parallel this truth: (Chaps. 1-3): Our position—what we are in Christ; (Chaps. 4-6): Our practice—what we should be in ourselves. The first half has to do with doctrine, the second half with duty. In the first three chapters our position is often described by such phrases as “in Christ,” “in Christ Jesus,” “in Him,” “in whom.” In the last three chapters the phrase, “in the Lord,” is often used to express the believer's responsibility to Christ as Lord. Someone has well said that the first part of the letter pictures the believer in the heavenlies in Christ, whereas the last part views him in the kitchen.
Now we are ready to consider some of the spiritual blessings in the heavenly places which are ours in Christ.
1:4 The first is what is commonly known as election. Just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love.
Notice first the positive fact of election in the words, He chose us. Then there is the positional aspect of the truth, in Him: it is in the Person and work of the Lord Jesus that all God's purposes for His people are brought to pass. The time of God's election is indicated by the expression, before the foundation of the world. And the purpose is that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love. This purpose will not be completely realized until we are with Him in heaven (1Jn_3:2), but the process should be going on continually in our lives down here.
Prayer: “Lord, make me holy now, since this is Your eventual purpose for me. Amen.”
EXCURSUS ON DIVINE ELECTION
The doctrine of election raises serious problems in the human mind, so we must consider more fully what the Bible does (and does not) teach on this subject.
First, it teaches that God does choose men to salvation (2Th_2:13). It addresses believers as those who are “elect according to the foreknowledge of God” (1Pe_1:2). It teaches that people can know whether they are elect by their response to the gospel: those who hear and believe it are elect (1Th_1:4-7).
On the other hand, the Bible never teaches that God chooses men to be lost. The fact that He chooses some to be saved does not imply that He arbitrarily condemns all the rest. He never condemns men who deserve to be saved (there are none), but He does save some who ought to be condemned. When Paul describes the elect, he speaks of them as “vessels of mercy which He had prepared beforehand for glory” (Rom_9:23); but when he turns to the lost, he simply says, “vessels of wrath prepared for destruction” (Rom_9:22). God prepares vessels of mercy to glory, but He does not prepare men for destruction: they do this for themselves by their own unbelief.
The doctrine of election lets God be God. He is sovereign, that is, He can do as He pleases, although He never pleases to do anything unjust. If left alone, all men would be lost. Does God have the right to show mercy to some?
But there is another side to the story. The same Bible that teaches sovereign election also teaches human responsibility. No one can use the doctrine of election as an excuse for not being saved. God makes a bona fide offer of salvation to all people everywhere (Joh_3:16; Joh_3:36; Joh_5:24; Rom_10:9, Rom_10:13). Anyone can be saved by repenting of his sins and believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, if a person is lost, it is because he chooses to be lost, not because God desires it.
The fact is that the same Bible teaches election and free salvation to all who will receive it. Both doctrines are found in a single verse: “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out” (Joh_6:37). The first half of the verse speaks of God's sovereign choice; the last half extends the offer of mercy to all.
This poses a difficulty for the human mind. How can God choose some and yet offer salvation freely to all men? Frankly, this is a mystery. But the mystery is on our side, not on God's. The best policy for us is to believe both doctrines because the Bible teaches both. The truth is not found somewhere between election and man's free will, but in both extremes. W. G. Blaikie summarizes:
Divine sovereignty, human responsibility and the free and universal offer of mercy are all found in Scripture, and though we are unable to harmonize them by our logic, they all ought to have a place in our minds.
1:5 The second spiritual blessing from the treasury of God's grace is predestination, or foreordination. Though somewhat related to election, it is not the same. Election pictures God's choice of people to salvation. But predestination is an advance on this: it means that God determined ahead of time that all who would be saved would also be adopted into His family as sons. He could have saved us without making us His sons, but He chose to do both.
Many translations link the last two words of verse 4 with verse 5 as follows: in love having predestined us.
This reminds us of the unique affection that prompted God to deal with us so graciously.
We have the fact of our glorious adoption in the phrase, having predestined us to adoption as sons. In the NT, adoption means placing a believer in the family of God as a mature, adult son with all the privileges and responsibilities of sonship (Gal_4:4-7). The Spirit of adoption plants within the believer the instinct to address God as Father (Rom_8:15).
Our adoption as sons is by Jesus Christ. God could never have brought us into this position of nearness and dearness to Himself as long as we were in our sins. So the Lord Jesus came to earth, and by His death, burial, and resurrection He settled the sin question to God's satisfaction. It is the infinite value of His sacrifice on Calvary that provides a righteous basis on which God can adopt us as sons.
And it is all according to the good pleasure of His will. This is the sovereign motivation behind our predestination. It answers the question, “Why did He do it?” Simply because it was His good pleasure. He could not be satisfied until He had surrounded Himself with sons, conformed to the image of His only begotten Son, with Him and like Him forever.
1:6 To the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He has made us accepted in the Beloved. As Paul has contemplated the grace of God first in electing us and then in predestining us to be His sons, he punctuates his meditation with this refrain that is at once an exclamation, an explanation, and an exhortation. It is an exclamation—a holy gasp at the transcendent glories of such grace. It is an explanation that the object and the result of all God's gracious dealings with us is His own glory. Eternal adoration is due to Him for such matchless favor. Notice the terms of His grace—He (freely) made us accepted. The recipients of His grace—us. The channel of His grace—in the Beloved. Finally, it is an exhortation. Paul is saying, “Let us praise Him for His glorious grace”. Before we go any farther, let us do it!
Great God of wonders! All Thy ways
Display Thine attributes divine;
But the bright glories of Thy grace
Above Thine other wonders shine:
Who is a pard'ning God like Thee?
Or who has grace so rich and free?
—Samuel Davies
1:7 As we trace the sublime sweep of God's eternal plan for His people, we come next to the fact of redemption. This describes that aspect of the work of Christ by which we are freed from the bondage and guilt of sin and introduced into a life of liberty. The Lord Jesus is the Redeemer (In Him we have redemption). We are the redeemed. His blood is the ransom price; nothing less would do.
One of the results of redemption is the forgiveness of sins. Forgiveness is not the same as redemption; it is one of its fruits. Christ had to make full satisfaction for our sins before they could be forgiven. This was done at the cross. And now—
Stern justice can demand no more
And mercy can dispense her store.
The measure of our forgiveness is given in the words, according to the riches of His grace. If we can measure the riches of God's grace, then we can measure how fully He has forgiven us. His grace is infinite! So is His forgiveness!
1:8 It was in grace that He chose us, predestined us, and redeemed us. But that is not all. God has superabounded that same grace toward us in all wisdom and prudence. This means He has graciously shared His plans and purposes with us. His desire is that we should have intelligence and insight into His plans for the church and for the universe. And so He has taken us into His confidence, as it were, and has revealed to us the great goal toward which all history is moving.
1:9 Paul now explains the particular way in which God has abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence, namely, by making known to us the mystery of His will. This is the dominant theme of the Epistle—the glorious truth concerning Christ and the church. It is a mystery, not in the sense that it is mysterious, but that it is a sacred secret previously unknown but now revealed to the saints. This glorious plan originated in the sovereign will of God, quite apart from any outside influences: it was according to His good pleasure. And the grand subject of the plan is the Lord Jesus Christ; this is indicated by the clause, which He purposed in Himself.
1:10 Now Paul begins a more detailed explanation of the secret of God's plan, and in this chapter he is thinking particularly of the future aspect of the mystery. Chapters 2 and 3 will add further light on the present aspect of the mystery.
The time which Paul has in view is indicated by the expression, the dispensation (administration, Greek, oikonomia)
of the fullness of the times. We understand this to refer to the Millennium, when Christ will return to the earth to reign as King of kings and Lord of lords. God has a special economy or plan of administration for the final era of human history on this earth.
The plan is “to head up all things in the Christ” (JND). During the Millennial Reign, all things in heaven and on earth will be summed up in Christ. The Savior who is now rejected and disowned will then be the preeminent One, the Lord of all, the object of universal worship. This is God's goal—to set up Christ as Head over all things, heavenly and earthly, in the kingdom.
The extent of the dominion of Christ is found in the words, “the things in the heavens and the things upon the earth” (JND). Bellett writes:
This is a secret never made known before. In the prophet Isaiah, we get a beautiful picture of the millennial earth; but do we ever get the millennial heavens with Christ at their head? Was it ever said by Isaiah that all things in heaven and earth should be headed up in the glorified Man?
Verse 10 is sometimes used to support the false doctrine of universal salvation. It is twisted to suggest that eventually everything and everyone will be restored and reconciled in Christ. But that is quite foreign to the passage. Paul is speaking about universal dominion, not universal salvation!
1:11 One vital feature of the mystery is that believing Jews and believing Gentiles have their share in this grand program of God. The apostle speaks of the mystery in relation to Jewish believers in verses 11 and 12; in relation to Gentile believers in verse 13; then he combines them both in verse 14.
As for the Christians of Jewish ancestry, Paul writes, In Him also we have obtained an inheritance. Their right to a share is not based on their former national privileges, but solely on their union with Christ. The inheritance here looks forward to the time when they and all true believers will be manifested to an amazed world as the Body of Christ, the Bride of the Lamb.
From all eternity these Jewish Christians were marked out for this place of privilege by the sovereign will of God, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will.
1:12 The purpose of this predestination was that they should be to the praise of His glory. In other words, they are trophies of the grace of God, exhibiting what He can do with such unlikely raw materials, and thus bringing glory to Him.
The apostle speaks of himself and other believing Jews as we who first trusted in Christ. He is thinking of the godly remnant of Jews who responded to the gospel in the early days of Christianity. The good news was first preached to the Jews. Most of the nation of Israel flatly rejected it. But the godly remnant believed on the Lord Jesus. Paul was one of that number.
It will be different when the Savior returns to the earth the second time. Then the nation will look on Him whom they pierced and will mourn for Him as for an only Son (Zec_12:10). “And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: ‘The Deliverer will come out of Zion, and He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob’” (Rom_11:26).
Paul and his Christian contemporaries of Jewish background trusted in the Messiah before the rest of the nation. That is why he uses the description, “we ... who have trusted beforehand in Christ” (FWG).
Those who “fore-hoped” in Messiah will reign with Him over the earth. The rest of the nation will be the earthly subjects of His kingdom.
1:13 Now Paul switches from believers who had been born Jews to those who had been born Gentiles; he indicates this by changing from “we” to you. Those who have been saved from paganism have a share in the mystery of God's will, as well as converted Jews. And so the apostle here traces the steps by which the Ephesians and other Gentiles had been brought into union with Christ.
They heard the gospel. They believed in Christ. They were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise. First they heard the word of truth, the gospel of their salvation. Basically, this refers to the good news of salvation through faith in the Lord Jesus. But in a wider sense it includes all the teachings of Christ and the apostles.
Having heard this message, they made a commitment of themselves to Christ by a decisive act of faith. The Lord Jesus is the true object of faith. Salvation is found in Him alone.
As soon as they believed, they were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise. This means that every true believer receives the Spirit of God as a sign that he belongs to God and that he will be kept safe by God until the time he receives his glorified body. Just as in legal matters a seal indicates ownership and security, so it does in divine affairs. The indwelling Spirit brands us as God's property (1Co_6:19-20), and guarantees our preservation until the day of redemption (Eph_4:30).
Our seal is called the Holy Spirit of promise. First, He is the Holy Spirit; this is what He is in Himself. Then, He is the Spirit of promise. He was promised by the Father (Joe_2:28; Act_1:4), and by the Lord Jesus (Joh_16:7). In addition, He is the guarantee that all God's promises to the believer will be fulfilled.
Verse 13 rounds out the first of many mentions of the Trinity in this Letter:
God the Father (v. 3)
God the Son (v. 7)
God the Spirit (v. 13)
1:14 Again Paul changes his pronouns. He merges the “we” of verses 11 and 12 with the “you” of verse 13 to form the our of verse 14. By this deft literary device, he drops a hint of what he will more fully explain in chapters 2 and 3—the union of believing Jews and believing Gentiles to form a new organism, the church.
The Holy Spirit is the guarantee of our inheritance. This is a downpayment, pledging that the full amount will be paid. It is the same in kind as the full payment, but not the same in amount.
As soon as we are saved, the Holy Spirit begins to reveal to us some of the riches that are ours in Christ. He gives us foretastes of the coming glory. But how can we be sure that we will get the full inheritance some day? The Holy Spirit Himself is the earnest or guarantee.
As the seal, He guarantees that we ourselves will be kept safely for the inheritance. As the earnest, He guarantees the inheritance will be kept securely for us.
The Spirit is the guarantee until the redemption of the purchased possession. The guarantee looks forward to the full redemption, just as the firstfruits look forward to the complete harvest. The Spirit's role as earnest will cease when the purchased possession is redeemed. But what does Paul mean by the purchased possession?
1. He may mean our inheritance. All that God possesses is ours through the Lord Jesus: we are heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ (Rom_8:17; 1Co_3:21-23). The universe itself has been defiled through the entrance of sin, and needs to be reconciled and purified (Col_1:20; Heb_9:23). When Christ returns to the earth to reign, this groaning creation will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God (Rom_8:19-22).
2. The expression, the purchased possession, may mean the believer's body. Our spirits and souls were redeemed when we first believed, but the redemption of our bodies is still future. The fact that we suffer, grow old, and die proves that our bodies have not yet been redeemed. When Christ returns for us (1Th_4:13-18), our bodies will be fashioned anew so they can be conformed to the body of His glory (Php_3:21). Then they will be fully and forever redeemed (Rom_8:23).
3. Finally, the purchased possession may refer to the church (1Pe_2:9 : “His own special people”). In this case, its redemption also looks forward to the Rapture, when Christ will present the church to Himself a glorious church without spot or wrinkle or any such thing (Eph_5:27). Some believe that in this view, God's own possession may also include the OT saints.
Whichever view we hold, the ultimate result is the same—to the praise of His glory. God's marvelous plan for His people will then have reached a glorious consummation, and He will be the object of continual praise. Three times in this chapter Paul has reminded us that the intended goal and inevitable result of all God's actions is that He should be magnified and glorified.
To the praise of the glory of His grace (v. 6)
That we should be to the praise of His glory (v. 12)
To the praise of His glory (v. 14)
Appreciate you want to correct me, and some questions are ekpeiradzo/peiradzo...not good
Shalom Johann
