Alive from the Dead – Week 47 / November 18th

by admin

The Book of Ephesians is unique as, unlike any other Pauline Letter, it sets forth the mystical and eternal relationship between Jesus and His Church. The passage before us is then dynamic, thrilling and humbling all at the same time. It is therefore most worthy of our careful and prayerful meditation. It has three ideas:

1.    Our Condition V1-3
“And you he made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins
in which you once walked according to the course of this world,
according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who
now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we
all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling
the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature 
children of wrath, just as the others.”

We were dead in sins and trespasses: That is, we were fully corrupted by intentional and unintentional sins. These have cut us off from God and made us slaves to the world and the Devil. We are thus dead, dominated and doomed! Dead because, having been severed from God, our natures have become fully incompatible with His. Paul, writing to the Galatian believers tells us what a dead nature looks like. (Galatians 5:19-21)
Dominated because we slavishly adopted the conduct of the world while all the time thinking that we were “cool” and we were more under the influence of dark unseen powers than we thought. And………doomed because we once lived under the wrath of God! All this leaves us without hope; meaning that our very best efforts could not rectify the position we were in or save us. Paul elsewhere calls this state of being, “wretched.”

2.    Our Deliverance V4-9
“But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with
which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made
us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and
raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places
in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding
riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by
Grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves;
it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.”

But God……, because of His mercy, kindness and great love for us has given us an opportunity in Christ, and by His death and resurrection, to start life again. We can be born again! Jesus died for us and as us and so with Him we came out of the grave a totally new, transformed and perfected. The awful consequences of our sins and trespasses have been forever removed from us. This is our deliverance from death! Note: In Him you were born again and went to Heaven. This means that His life in you guarantees an all new sin-conquering dynamic in your body. By grace you have been saved and thus you are no longer a slave to sin! You are truly alive!

3.    Our Transformation V10
“For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works
Which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”

By Christ’s work on the cross we have been transformed from incompatibility with God to compatibility with God. You are not saved by works but for Godly works that will spring from your new life; now and throughout all the ages to come. Here is a hint at the eternal purpose that God has for us. Death has been abolished by Jesus and now the focus is on our eternal usefulness to God. You can begin that journey today!

Our pilgrimage on earth as a Christian is an opportunity to experience the transforming power of Jesus in us. In this process, through challenges good and bad, we prove the faithfulness of God, the love of God for us and His sovereign care over our lives.

Malcolm Hedding

©Malcolm Hedding Ministries

2012Devotional