EPHESIANS 2:1–10
BY RICHARD TINKER
Did you try to get better before you finally trusted Jesus? Maybe you were considering baptism, or maybe you were thinking about starting church attendance. Maybe you were just a child, and you started to try to not fight with your brother or sister. Some of you might have tried to stop lying, cursing, drinking too much or maybe doing drugs or pornography or—fill in the blank.
How did your plan work? Did you make yourself feel good enough to come to Jesus?
As an Adventist I often tried to clean up my act, but I never felt good enough. Even now, as a born again Christian, I see that there is often a temptation for believers to fall back into this deception—feeling that we need to clean up before praying, or opening our Bibles, or coming to church.
Ephesians 2:1–10 is to me one of the best and clearest statements in the Bible of the progression of the believer—from being dead to becoming a living worker for the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus.
The first time I sat in a biblical church, our pastor Gary Inrig was teaching through this passage. I was sure that he must have heard that I was coming and had chosen this passage just for me—later my wife told me she thought that it was just for her!
Here is this amazing passage written by the apostle to the Gentiles—our apostle Paul:
Ephesians 2:1–10—And you were dead in the trespasses and 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 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. And this is not your own doing; it is 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.
We were dead
You—me—all of us were born into this world spiritually dead. In fact, Paul not only says that we were dead in our trespasses and sins, but we were by nature children of wrath. In other words, the only thing we deserved was God’s wrath—everlasting hell.
You might ask, “Why were we born deserving wrath and hell? Babies haven’t committed any sins yet when they are born!”
Remember what God said to Adam and Eve? He told them that if they ate fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, they would surely die, and they would die the very day they ate it. They did die—they became spiritually dead—their spirits were dead—and they were unable to be good or seek God (Rom. 3:9–18). They hid from Him in shame.
Their spiritual death is our inheritance, Paul explains in Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15. Because our first father Adam died, he gave us death for a legacy. Now we need a new Father who can make our spirits alive again.
I grew up in Seventh-day Adventism. We were taught that Adam and Eve “began to die”, making God’s statement that they would die the day they ate the fruit less than accurate. Because Adventists don’t believe that we have a human spirit that can be separated from the body, they can’t understand either spiritual death or spiritual life. They don’t grasp the truth that we can be born again and made spiritually alive. Instead, to Adventists like I was, human death is purely physical, and spiritual death is more of a mental attitude and bad genetics that cause us to have “propensities to sin”.
I did not understand that those who are dead and never respond to God’s call will eventually suffer eternally, like those whom John says will worship the beast at the end of the age. In the book of Revelation, he describes this reality in the context of those who worship the beast and its image:
…he also will drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name (Rev. 14:10, 11).
In my past I did not believe a good God would make people suffer eternally for a few years of sinning. I believed John’s words were a metaphor for wicked people suffering until they were burned up. Since I didn’t understand spiritual death or the sovereign holiness of God, eternal suffering made no sense.
The Bible tells us the truth, though. Our natural position before our Holy God is that we were born into a lost race. We had no merit in ourselves to change that destiny of an eternal future which involved torment. We were “dead men walking”, as the saying goes, as certainly as are those who are on death row as they walk to their punishment.
Adventist beginnings
I was born in an Adventist hospital, early Sabbath morning. I was born one month early, but because my parents couldn’t afford the expensive hospital care that premature babies often need, the doctor declared me healthy enough and sent me home. My mom told me later that I looked awful—I had no forehead, and she thought I looked like a devil child. (The Adventist prophet Ellen White said that Satan has a sinister sloping forehead, and my head reminded my mother of him.)
But that assessment was not far from reality. Indeed, I was born into the kingdom of darkness—I needed to be saved!
Hope comes in Ephesians 2:4,5:
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…
Did you see that? God made us alive together with Christ, and we didn’t have to clean up first. God gives us life in Christ when we are dead!
My memories of my religious upbringing centered around our Adventist “more than a prophet” Ellen G. White. My family had worship time twice each day. Morning worship almost always involved a short devotional reading from Ellen, and then at bedtime, worship involved my parents reading the day’s lesson from the Sabbath School quarterly. The lesson would feature a Bible text and then teaching that was mostly based on Ellen’s writings.
I began to realize that I wanted to belong to Jesus when I was about seven. I got a Bible for Christmas and carried it proudly to church each Sabbath. I tried to read it but soon got bogged down in all the strange statutes and laws that were given to the Israelites.
When I was ten, I went to summer camp. At the first meeting around the campfire, I prayed to God to forgive me and make me His. The camp pastor prayed a prayer that any camper that needed to get right with God wouldn’t be able to sleep that night. I went to bed with quite a bit of fear that God would keep me up all night, but I slept very well. That was my first glimmer of hope that salvation was a gift and not by works!
I realize now that God was calling me even when I was a child, but I still thought that works were somehow a part of the salvation package. These works included Saturday Sabbath observance, vegetarianism, and a lot more! But that experience at camp showed me that God was the power—not my works.
If you reading this look alive to those who see you, but you know inside that you are dead in your sins, respond to God’s call and repent of your sins and trust the Lord Jesus—trust his death, burial, and resurrection—that his death has been enough to pay for all the wrath that you deserve.
Grace not works
…by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, (Eph. 2:5,6).
Not only is it by grace that we are saved—not by our works or by cleaning up our act—but we are spiritually seated with our Lord Jesus in heavenly places. That promise is real; it is not a metaphor. Do you live in a tiny apartment, or is your house on a street where drug-trafficking is common? This earth is not your home. If you have believed and trusted Jesus, you are always with Him in heavenly places. Even death cannot remove you. And that spiritual reality will become a physical one as well when our Lord Jesus raptures us to be with Him forever.
…so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus (Eph. 2:7).
And this passage says more—this reality that we experience in Christ Jesus is for the purpose of showing the riches of God’s grace which cannot be measured. His kindness to us in making us alive in Jesus and giving us salvation is God’s Exhibit A of His grace which He displays to heaven and earth through all the ages to come. Our eternal life is for His glory!
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 works, so that no one may boast (Eph. 2:8, 9).
And then, to make it absolutely clear in which direction the good stuff is flowing, the passage clearly states that even the required faith is a gift of God. We do not generate our own faith. God gives us the faith we need to believe and trust in Jesus. There is nothing that we do to get this amazing kindness from our Lord.
Created for good works
God doesn’t stop with simply saving us. Once He makes us new people with His own eternal life, He surprises us again. He gives us His work to do for His glory. Verse 10 says,
For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
My training as an Adventist included my not swimming or riding my bike on Sabbath or doing anything else that might distract me from the holiness of the day. I also was taught to eat the Eden diet—which meant I was a vegetarian. We didn’t play with regular playing cards, didn’t go to bowling alleys or movie theaters, or even to the circus. The way we dressed was also important. Our prophet wrote councils against wearing tight clothing or belts, so I had to wear suspenders for a time in grade school. There were other things we were compelled to do as well: we had to give at least 10 percent for tithe, but we were strongly encouraged to give 20 percent.
All these do’s and don’ts were the works I did in my past, but are these the good works that we are created to do?
They were works of the flesh, not of the Spirit. They were detailed by a modern prophet and required by a false religion. Furthermore, there are civic clubs, neighborhood watch groups, ladies quilting clubs, homeless feeding programs, and countless other organizations that exist to do good works. These good deeds can be done by anyone—spiritually dead or alive—but God has created us for good works that are His own.
God makes us alive when He saves us, and then He gives us His work to do, which He prepared for us beforehand. What a wonderful, gracious God we have. He saves us, He makes us alive, and He gives us work that was prepared specifically for us to do—it all comes from the hand of our Father who loves us.
Works of God vs Works of the flesh
This subject of good works is often misunderstood. Since the works may look the same, how can we tell the difference between works of the flesh and works of God? As an Adventist I believed that all those works I did demonstrated that I loved God. They were my proof that I was right.
Jesus told us the difference between works of the flesh and works of God in Matthew 7:22–23:
On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
God’s works are His gifts, and they flow out of a life that has been made alive in Jesus. Works of the flesh flow out of a human heart that has not trusted Jesus and been born again. We cannot always look at another person’s good works and know whether or not they are born again, but the Lord knows.
When we believe Jesus and trust His blood to pay for our sins, God gives us new life. We are born again. From then on He asks us to trust Him, and He will give us His work to do. He does not ask us to work in order to get His approval. He asks us to trust Him, and He uses us to glorify Him.
We might wonder what work God has prepared for us to do. In fact, the New Testament gives us many examples. In I Peter 2:9 we are told that we are chosen so that we may proclaim the excellencies of our God who called us out of darkness.
For example, Life Assurance Ministries actively calls people out of a false religion into Biblical truth. It is so fun to witness new believers who are excited to know Jesus. They can’t help but tell others the awesome changes they have experienced by believing and trusting in Jesus—they can’t stop telling of his excellencies!
This declaration of God’s goodness is a work of God that He has prepared for us.
In Hebrews 3:13 the writer tells of another work that we as believers are called to do. The text says:
But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.
We can help someone keep from being hardened by sin by teaching and encouraging them. Sometimes we feel down or maybe even are considering sin, and a brother or sister in the church gives us wise council and we are encouraged. This exhortation and encouragement is the work God gives us to do in the Body to build one another up.
Another work that is given to us is made clear in Galatians 6:1-2:
Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
By bearing each other’s burdens we fulfill the law of Christ. I was raised to believe that my greatest efforts should be directed towards the task of keeping the Ten Commandments perfectly—and this obedience would result in vindicating God’s character—as if any creature can vindicate the Creator. But here we find that we can fulfill Christ’s law by bearing one another’s burdens—and we can only do that work by having Jesus’ life in us. There is no hint of the Old Covenant in this command.
Remember the judgement scene that Jesus taught about in Matthew 25? He talked about two groups of people—those on His right and those on His left. Those on his right who were saved—the ones whom God knew—had done the good works He had brought to them. Those works included feeding the hungry, giving water to the thirsty, welcoming strangers, giving clothes to the naked, visiting the sick and those in prison. Those on the left had not cared for the people that crossed their paths. The difference between these two groups was their condition: the ones who cared for people were alive in Christ. The ones who didn’t recognize those who needed their help were still dead in their sins. God did not “know” them.
So, when God makes us alive in Christ, He makes us new creations. Our new birth is His workmanship, and He gives us this new life in order to do good works for His glory.
Paul talks about how doing God’s work looks in a local church. In Romans 12 he teaches us how the church body works together, each member using his or her unique abilities to do the work that God has assigned each one—much like our bodies have many parts that work together to sustain our life. Sometimes the work the Lord gives us in His body seems mundane and repetitive, yet it is what God gives us. Sometimes His work is changing diapers and disciplining our kids, or mowing the lawn, or caring for an elderly parent. God asks us to honor Him by serving each other joyfully.
So, Ephesians 2:10 tells us two important things: God creates us new in Jesus, and this new life is His preparation of us to do His work. In other words, our new birth includes God’s redeeming us for His glory so that in Him we are equipped to do the work He planned for us to do. Let’s read that verse again:
For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
Prepared in advance
When I was still wandering in the wilderness of a cultic religion, even though I didn’t know it, God was preparing me for work He would eventually give me. Let me tell you about my journey and how God led me through school, and then job after job to prepare me for the work that He had already prepared beforehand.
When I enrolled at Pacific Union College, all I could think about was being a music teacher. I studied music history, theory, composition, conducting, and practiced endlessly on my trombone. But God had other plans. So he led me through a journey of changing majors several times, resulting in my learning printing, photography, news writing, and ultimately I graduated with a degree in public relations with a media emphasis. But my education wasn’t finished.
For a reason unknown to me back then, I also took an evening class in accounting, thinking it might be useful. It seemed random at the time.
After I graduated, my first job was at the Pacific Union Conference headquarters of the Seventh-day Adventist church for the five-state Pacific Southwest region. I ran the print shop and designed educational materials for the different departments headquartered there. But God was also teaching me about the inside of Adventism—how the leaders work and behave in their offices, and how the machinery of the organization functions. I saw and learned things most young Adventists do not see.
I later moved to an Adventist publisher that was in charge of producing the Sabbath School teaching lessons for the church’s high-school aged students. I worked under an amazing designer who gave me an understanding of the design and layout of publications. Because of that good experience, I was able to get a job later as art director at The Quiet Hour Ministries in Redlands, California. There I was in charge of designing all their printed products, including magazines, books, pamphlets, and advertisements. God was still training me—but I had more to learn!
I was offered a job at Loma Linda University’s School of Dentistry in their Educational Support Services department. I later became the director and learned by experience how to lead a team of workers in the production of educational art, movies, books, and online programming.
At each point in my life, God was leading me and teaching me, so that when I lost my job at Loma Linda, I was prepared for the next step.
God knows before we are born the life we will live and the work we will do. God doesn’t waste anything. Psalm 139:16 says:
Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.
Every day of our lives was formed before we were even alive. God not only plans the work for us to do, but He knows every day that leads us to that work. We can trust God with our lives—no matter what stage of life we are in.
Furthermore, Hebrews 12:10-11 explains that the discouragement and despair we sometimes feel is part of His teaching us to trust Him so that we can do what He asks us to do:
…he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
Sometimes our discipline seems unrelated to our work for the Lord, but He is teaching us to trust Him and to learn to live by His word as His Spirit convicts us. God taught me to wait for Him and to trust His timing as I worked in an increasingly hostile place during my years at Loma Linda University.
In June, 2006, I was fired on the very day that God had planned for me, when He had prepared me for His next assignment. I was fired for cause because of my work with Former Adventist Fellowship and Proclamation! magazine. I felt adrift; I had no income for four months, and I didn’t know what I would do next. My wife reminds me that I even seemed a bit depressed, forgetting to shave and shower sometimes. Yet I saw God sustain us until He brought the next step to me.
That next step was one I never would have planned. He gave me work overseeing Life Assurance Ministries, a ministry which exists to help others leave the church into which I was born and in which I had stayed for over 40 years.
Now, in this job, on a daily basis, I use all the education and skills and knowledge that my past gave me. And that crazy accounting class—it helps me as I serve on three different boards that present quarterly financial statements that I am expected to understand, and it helps me prepare and administer the operating budget for Life Assurance Ministries.
Moreover, all my knowledge of the dark core of Adventism drove me to dream of a Biblical church planted in the very town where I used to worship each Saturday, where I worked long hours at the School of Dentistry during the week. Now, by God’s grace, we worship every Sunday at Redeemer Fellowship in Loma Linda under the shadow of a Health Sciences University and Hospital dedicated to the pagan belief that man is only physical, and there is no hell to fear.
Summary
We can summarize Ephesians 2:1–10 with four points.
First: We are born dead in sin. Our spirits are dead, and each one of us is by nature a child of wrath, following the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. We are born condemned to eternal death.
Second: God intervenes in our hopeless state. Because Jesus came into our condemned world and died the death our sin demanded, God raised Him from the dead. Now, when we believe Jesus and trust in His blood as the payment for our sin, God raises us to life in Christ.
Not only does He raise us to life and literally seat us spiritually with Christ in heavenly places, but God uses our new life in Jesus as His demonstration of who He is. His kindness to us condemned humans, taking us from death to life in Christ, is an eternal display of His grace.
Third: Our new life is a miracle. It has nothing at all to do with any work we do. We are saved by His grace through faith—and even our faith is His gift to us. We can never say that we are saved because we pleased God, worked hard, or did our best. We have faith because God gives us faith, and we are saved because God raises us to life in His Son when we believe with the faith He gives us.
Fourth: When we are born again, our new life is God’s workmanship. When He gives us new life in Christ, He creates us for His work. Our new life and His Spirit in us equip us to do the work which He gives us. When we are still dead in our sin, the Lord knows who we will become and what He will give us to do. He prepares our work, and He prepares us for that work!
We can praise God for rescuing us from certain death, for making us alive in Jesus, and for equipping us for His purpose. †
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Wonderful article Richard! I am curious though as to your use of the word rapture in one place. I guess you’re simply referring to the second coming but would like to be clear about that.
Thank you & God Bless