Dead In Sin (Ephesians 2:1-3)
Introduction
If we could sum up the theology of the first chapter of Ephesians in two statements, it would be these:
1. God desires to magnify his glory in the praise of his saints through the renewal of the universe.
God has a sweeping, extensive, cosmic, all-encompassing plan which stretches back from before the foundations of the earth on the one hand and into a blessed and healed future on the other. In eternity past, within the counsels of the Trinity, he devised a plan through which he would accomplish the magnification of his own glory in the praise of his saints through the renewal of the world. And so he pours out all blessing, and he chooses and he redeems in his Son’s blood and he lavishes the riches of grace and he reveals to his the mystery which he is setting forth in Christ. And that plan, historically speaking, climaxes in the reuniting of all things under the headship of Christ.
2. God accomplishes that desire through the death, resurrection, ascension, and rule of Jesus Christ.
And God has accomplished this through his immeasurably great power. How would God magnify his own name through the praises of his people in a reunited world under the headship of Christ? Namely, through the death, resurrection, and exultation of Jesus Christ. Through his death he cut the Gordian knot of sin. Through his resurrection he opened the door of the new creation to invade the old. Through his exultation he reigns over angelic powers and all other authorities so as to restore the rule and reign of mankind over all of creation. And then, having put all things under his feet, God “gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.” And all of this accrues to the expression of the magnificent power of God which we must know by the inner revelation of the Spirit of God.
So now, here comes the crucial question for understanding this very familiar passage: What happens when those large, sweeping, expansive, all-encompassing realities collide with your life? What happens when God’s eternal plan to magnify his name in the praises of his saints through the renewal of the world crosses your path? What happens where cosmic realities collide with sinners? And that is what these verses teach us.
God has a tendency to take massive realities and squeeze them through tiny ones in order to make more evident and more obvious what he does. Massive, cosmic, all-encompassing realities are hard to grasp because we are so small and finite. So, God helps us by making miniature versions of his work on the level of our normal experiences. In other words, your life is meant by God to be a walking illustration of God’s saving power. God’s work in your individual life is a small to-scale miniature model of the grand and glorious plan to renew the cosmos. God’s salvation that he has given to you is a microcosm of the macrocosmic work in all of creation.
This is very evident when you look at all the concepts which Paul continues from chapter one into chapter two.
· 2:1, 5—dead in trespasses; 1:7—the forgiveness of our trespasses
· 2:2—lit. “the age of this world” and 2:7—in the “coming ages”; 1:21—the supremacy of Christ “not only in this age but also in the one to come”
· 2:2—the “ruler” of the “authority” of the air; 1:21—Christ has been raised up above all “rule” and “authority.”
· 2:2—Satan is “working” in the sons of disobedience; 1:11—God is “working” all things according to the counsel of his will; 1:19—the “working of the might of his strength”; 1:20—which he “worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead”
· 2:4—God is “rich” in mercy”; 1:7—God has forgiven us “according to the riches of his grace.”
· 2:5—God “made us alive with Christ”; 1:20—God “raised him from the dead”
· 2:6—God “seated us with him in the heavenly places”; 1:20—God “seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places.”
· 2:7—God’s riches of grace are “immeasurable”; 1:19—the greatness of his power is “immeasurable”
· 1:7, 8—God’s “grace”; 2:6—that which is praised and given in Jesus, 2:7—the riches of his “grace,”
· 2:8—Salvation is God’s “gift”; 1:17—God “gives” the Spirit of revelation and 1:22 “gives” Christ to the church as head of all things
I go through all that to help show you that Paul has not left his subject. He is still dead set on making apparent to you what you are. God desires to magnify his praise in your mouth by renewing everything. He has and is accomplishing that through the work of Jesus Christ. And now, you are a miniature model of the future world. The cosmic work of God has intersected with your individual life
That means at least two things: 1) Your testimony is exceedingly meaningful. Through your testimony of how God saved you by his grace, you bear witness to the fact that God’s saving plan for the entire universe is still right on track. 2) Your Christian walk is exceedingly important. Through the way you live as a Christian—the good works that you walk in every day—you demonstrate to everyone around you that the future world, the new creation, is here and lives in you. And when you sin, you act in a contradictory way to who you are and to what the world will ultimately be. So, how does God’s plan for the universe intersect with you personally? (“Personally” is the key. 2:1-10 deal with the individual. 2:11-22 deal with the corporate).
Over the next few weeks, we will be walking through these 10 verses with three answers to that question. And the first one is this: God’s plan for the universe intersects with you personally by meeting you in your sinfulness. In other words, if I am to become a little microcosm in the magnification of his name through the renewal of the universe in Jesus Christ, then God must overcome my sin. Thus, Paul describes our sinful state.
Sin is not comfortable to talk about. Many, if not all, of us would prefer to speak of things more comfortable and less ugly. Thus, many preachers and Christians shy away from talking about sin, especially when confronting the world. The Bible tells repeated examples of those who were hated, persecuted, and even killed for confronting the sin of sinners.
And yet the ugliness of sin is the context from which God has rescued us. Without an accurate understanding of our sinful state before God intervened, we will never have a proper appreciation for the work he has done on our behalf. Ralph Venning, a Puritan preacher, wrote a book called “The Sinfulness of Sin.” He begins his book by saying, “It cannot but be extremely useful to let men see what sin is: how prodigiously vile, how deadly mischievous, and therefore how monstrously ugly and odious a thing sin is.” That may seem like a downer, but then he goes on to argue that without seeing sin for what it is, we cannot admire the free and rich grace of God as we should; we cannot believe on the Lord Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of our sins; we cannot see the rightness and justice of the law of God in contrast; we cannot hate sin and reject it and repent of it; we cannot truly desire righteousness as we ought; we cannot improve in our love toward God and our love toward our neighbor by recognizing the ways in which we still sin against them; and we cannot admire by contrast the immaculate beauty of God’s holiness and the purity of the new world.
So, for all of those purposes, we need the message of Paul in these three verses. In these first three verses, he gives 8 characteristics of sin that we might fully grasp our fallen state before Christ.
1. Sin is spiritual death.
“And you were dead in…trespasses and sins…” Of course he does not mean physically, but spiritually. It is a death which walks, follows, disobeys, lives, and performs sin.
Sin and death always go together. Even as God said in the garden, “Do not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.” The very fact that they did not immediately die implies that the death they died was not merely physical, but something more profound, more radical, more deadly. Sin is the breaking of God’s law, and breaking God’s law brings death, and that death consists in being cut off from the life of God, separated from the overflowing joy, blessedness, and life within the Trinity, destitute of communion with him and void of participation in his own life.
Thus, the realm in which we are dead is in trespasses and sins. Our living death is in reference to the sins and trespasses we commit. Notice the plural. This is not just one sin, or one trespass, nor is it sin and trespass generally considered, but the whole innumerable mass of them. All the transgressions of God’s law are all considered as a mass together. And each sin in that mass is another stage in the decay of the soul. Every trespass off-gasses the stench of our spiritual soul-rot. And the rot of the soul spreads to the body, and so the body slowly decays, falls apart, and eventually stops working entirely. Before Christ, we were dead in trespasses and sins.
In reality all of life dies. You die on the inside and the outside. Every aspect of your life experiences death when you live in sin. John Street, professor of counselling at the Master’s Seminary, in his book Passions of the Heart makes this point well, pointing to various areas in which we experience death:
· Our hope dies. We are trapped in our sins and have no promise of any power for a way out, leading ultimately to a hopeless eternity.
· Our usefulness dies. Our sins render us ineffectual as they consume more and more of our attention and life.
· Our conscience dies as we repeatedly defile and sear it, to the point where we can no longer tell right from wrong anymore.
· Our relationships die as we sacrifice them on the altar of our lusts and neglect the most meaningful earthly things we have.
· Our time dies as we devote more and more of it to obtaining the precious lusts of our hearts.
· Our resources die as we expend them in our insatiable quest for the desires of our hearts.
· Eventually our bodies die as they are consumed by stress or overeating or diseases or murder or AIDs or innumerable other complications from sin.
Sin is death. And those who give themselves to sin will die.
2. Sin immerses us in a habitual lifestyle of transgression.
“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked…” This death in sin was not merely a one-time thing, but an ongoing pattern of life, exhibited by an entire lifestyle immersed in trespasses and sins. It wasn’t like getting wet—a splash of water that dries in a few minutes. Rather, it was like being strapped to an anchor and thrown into the sea. Sin is not just a hobby. It’s our job. It's not an activity we do but who we are.
To this point, “in Christ” has been a repeated. Everything is “in Christ.” In the same way that you are “in Christ”—joined to him, immersed in him, married to him—you used to walk “in trespasses and sins”—joined to them, immersed in them, married to them.
We make a habit out of sinning. In fact, we are so habituated in sinning, that we often do not even realize we are walking in it. This is illustrated really well in anxiety. Anxiety, strictly speaking, is not a choice. Those who have had a panic attack know what it is to be overcome by the overpowering feeling of panic, and that there is really nothing you can do to escape it. However, that episode of panic was the result of a thousand other smaller choices that you didn’t realize were driven by you lust for control or approval or whatever. We habituate ourselves into acting in sinful ways, and then we are surprised at the affects they have when they surface in some other way.
Thus, the worrier walks in his sin by living a lifestyle revolving around their own control. The glutton walks in his sin by living a lifestyle revolving around food. The sexual deviant walks in his sin by living a lifestyle revolving around novel sexual expression. The discontent man walks in his sin by living a lifestyle revolving around what he does not have. The self-righteous walks in his sin by living a lifestyle revolving around what he can accomplish in his own power. And so on. Our sin leads us to immerse ourselves in a particular lifestyle which is consumed with obtaining our own lusts and pleasures.
3. Sin acts according to the standards the age of this world.
“Following the course of this world.” And that lifestyle, as the ESV says “followed the course of this world.” That’s decent, but the literal translation is “in which you once walked, according to the age of this world.” That is the standard of behavior was the cues we took from the old age exhibited by the current, fallen world system.
It is odd for us to talk about the “age of this world.” Paul intends that we walk according to how old the world is. Rather, that this world—the fallen system of humanity—is characterized by a certain order. And Paul calls that order an age. You can see this in 1:21: Christ has been seated “far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, both in this age and in the one to come.” What Paul is saying is that there is a certain world order which exists now, and there is another one that is coming to take its place. So, when Paul says that we walk in our trespasses and sins “according to the age of this world,” he means that the standard for our habituated lifestyles in sin spring from the present, fallen world order, the present age.
We follow the world, down to fashion and hairstyle. This age is the age belonging to this world, the age dominated by sin and its effects, the age characterized by death. And we walk according to that world. It has certain rules by which it operates, standards which it imposes, expectations it has. For instance, a dominating law of the “age of this world” is “Be true to yourself. Don’t listen to what others say. The most authentic you is the most unique you.” And so, in our death-dealing lifestyles, we walk according to that age, that “course,” and we live in such a way that says, “I believe I should be as true to my own self as I possibly can.” The result is men who think they are women and the like.
People in the world think that they’re free. They aren’t. They follow the age of the world. All their life is determined for them. Their clothing, their hair, their thought, their society. Everything. It is only the Christian who is truly free precisely because he belongs to another age, another world.
4. Sin follows the direction of Satan.
“Following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience.” And here we have another example of the same thing. “Following” is better translated “according to.” Sin not only operates according to the standards of this fallen world system. It also operates according to the direction of Satan as he moves within that world system to shape it in wicked ways.
Make no mistake: Satan is a defeated foe. Jesus Christ, Paul has already said in 1:20–22 that Christ has been seated in the heavenly places—the spiritual realm of the activity of angels—far above all demonic powers of evil, and that those demonic powers of evil have been put “under his feet.” And if we have been raised up with Christ and seated with him in that same spiritual realm, then those demonic powers are also under our feet.
Yet we must not overstate our case, for even though Satan is a defeated foe, he is still an active foe. Some Christians put themselves at great disadvantage because they do not fully acknowledge that the Devil is still very much active in the old world system. John 8:44: “You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires.” John 12:31, “Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out.” While he has been cast out, he is nonetheless still very active and, in a sense, still “rules the world.” We know that because the same author in 1 John 5:19 said, “And we know that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.” Rev 12:9 speaks of an angelic war during which Satan was cast down out of heaven and his abode is now the earth. And one day, Revelation 20:2 Satan will be bound and inactive on the earth for a thousand years, during which time the earth will experience life and blessing and flourishing in a new way during Christ’s earthly reign.
But until then, Satan is very much active in this world. He is the “prince of the power of the air.” Literally, “the ruler of the authority of the air.” That means that he is the highest demonic power in the spiritual realm. And as such, he has the ability to direct “the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience.” What exactly that means is somewhat difficult to tell. I think it means that Satan is at work through the world system to create an environment conducive to sin and death. He does work directly sometimes. But he can work a whole lot more effectively indirectly, through the creation and influence of environments which “steal, kill, and destroy.” As one commentator said, the picture is one of “a guiding atmosphere in the world for which Satan is responsible; people imbibe it, and it is full of death and danger.”
5. Sin infects all humanity.
“Among whom we all once lived…” There is not a single one of us who is free from these influences. All of us once lived in sin. There are only two categories: those who have been born in sin, and those who have been saved out of sin. But all come into the world as sinners. David said it best, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me” (Psalm 51:5). From the moment we come into the world we are infected with the terminal disease of sin. Paul said it a different way in Romans 5:12, “Just as sin came into the world through one man [Adam], and death through sin, so death spread to all men because all sinned.” And Paul means that all sinned in two ways—we all sinned in Adam when he disobeyed God’s commandment, and then consequently we all expressed our own sinful natures in the various ways of our own choosing. All are sinners.
That is the state of humanity. And Paul says that we lived “among” them. That’s a decent translation, but it misses the true force of what Paul is saying. What it literally says is this: “the spirit now working in the sons of disobedience, in whom we all once walked.” And that brings us right back to that “in Christ” language. Just as we are now in Christ by the grace of God, we used to be “in the sons of disobedience,”—joined to them, immersed in them, part of them, participating in their life, goals, purposes, and ends. Just as we are now “in Christ” and therefrom “in” the new humanity, we used to be “in Adam” and “in” the old humanity.
And this is comprehensive: we all once conducted ourselves in their midst. There is not a single one of us in the church who got in because we were different. We were all the same. We may have expressed our sinfulness differently—some in more civilized and socially acceptable ways than others—but we were all cut from the same cloth, made of the same stuff, spun off the same spool. And that should be a deeply humbling thing to us in two directions. 1) You cannot look at anyone else in the church and look down on them, because we all came from the same place. 2) You cannot look down at anyone in the world, because you used to be exactly like them.
6. Sin proceeds from the inside of us.
“In the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind.” And here we have an entire sermon which addresses one of the greatest problems of our day, indeed of all human history. It is inborn and natural to assume that the problem with man is outside of us, when in reality the problem with you is inside of you. Psychologists would have you blame your sin on your parents and your upbringing. Others would have you blame it on your abusive past. Marxists would have you blame it on your social class. Neo-Marxists would have you blame it on your skin color. Among other things, you could blame it on your job, husband, wife, children, house, health, in-laws, messy neighbors, Democrats, Republicans, or low self-esteem. Whatever it is, we are dead set on blaming anyone but ourselves.
But listen really closely, because this is probably the most relevant point of this sermon: you are the problem. The problem is not what happened to you. It isn’t your skin color. It isn’t your upbringing. It isn’t the culture. It isn’t your financial or educational status. The problem is you. The problem is the sin that resides in you. The problem is that you are spiritually dead. The problem is that you habitually choose to sin. The problem is that you pattern your life after this present evil age. The problem is that you are dominated by the power of Satan. The problem is the same problem that every one else has: sin that dwells in you.
And that is radically good news! You may say, “How is that good news? You just told me that I am a terrible person, a sinner, that I am what’s wrong with the world. How is that good?” And the answer is this: it is only be reckoning with the way things really are that they can be made right. That’s the first step of recovery, right? Admit the problem? Until you recognize that you are what is wrong with the world, you will never look toward the solution which Jesus Christ provides. All other ways lie to you. They will tell you that you’re actually a good person, that you aren’t as bad as you think, and that with a little more effort or money or education or affirmation that you can be the solution! But that is unrealistic and untrue. It has never been true in all history, nor will it ever be true. Utopia is humanly unattainable. Martin Lloyd-Jones said this, “There is only one truly optimistic view of life, and that is the one which tells us that, though man is down in the depths of sin, the power of God can come and take hold of him and can raise him to the heights, and that it has done so in Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Therefore, turn away from the sins which you love! Turn to Jesus Christ! He is the solution! Look away from yourselves and your abilities. Don’t pay attention to your efforts or your failings. Rather, look only to Jesus Christ. The power of God which he worked in him when he raised him from the dead and seated him at the right hand of God can also raise you up from the dead and seat you with Christ in the heavenly places.
7. Sin stains our very nature.
“And were by nature children of wrath.” That is in part what it means that we are by nature children of wrath. The word is “phusei” and it means “a condition or circumstances as determined by birth.” Again, the world would lie to you and tell you that you are basically good, that you were born as an angelic gem of a person with all your own unique characteristics and abilities. Popular artist Lady Gaga wrote a song to this effect called “Born this way.” The lyrics to the chorus say, “I’m beautiful in my way, ‘Cause God makes no mistakes, I’m on the right track, baby, I was born this way, Don’t hide yourself in regret, Just love yourself and you’re set, I’m on the right track, baby, I was born this way.” In other words, be whoever you want to be. Don’t regret anything you want to do or be. It’s just the way you are, and God made you that way. In fact, if you were to deny those desires and ambitions, then you would be denying your very Creator. Aren’t the lies of Satan crafty?
But Paul disagrees. He says, yes, you were born this way. You were born dead in sin, habituated in transgression, dominated by Satan’s influence, dragged away by the influences of this sinful world system, and enslaved to your sinful passions. You are a child of wrath by your very nature.
Now, that doesn’t mean that the vestiges of the image of God are not alive in you. That doesn’t mean you only every make horrible, harmful, terrible choices. It doesn’t mean that you are as bad as you could be. But it does mean that your nature is tainted, and that therefore all your actions are stained. Even the best motives, intentions, and actions are stained with crimson blot of sin. Nothing we do is acceptable to God because it all proceeds from tainted nature.
8. Sin leads to the wrath of God.
“And were by nature children of wrath.” And therefore, all that we are, and all that we do, leads down the path of the wrath of God. Children of wrath are those who are by nature destined for judgment because of their actions. The wrath of God is coming. John the Baptist warned to flee from it. Paul said it is revealed even now against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in their unrighteousness (Rom 1:18). Wrath is for those who break the law (Rom 5:9). Paul will say later in this very letter “Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience” (Eph 5:6). In 2 Thess 1:7-10 says that the Lord Jesus will be “revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might, when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints.” Revelation 14:11 says “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.”
Conclusion
And so in conclusion we have just a few points of brief application.
1. Flee to Jesus Christ. He is the only solution to your sin problem! We must taste the solution: “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.”
2. Recognize that the problem is far worse than you think and that only the grace of God can save you. That is why Paul goes on to emphasize the grace of God: “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.” God will not save you in any way which will allow you to take any credit rightly. You are here only by the grace of God.
3. Be thankful that the Lord has reached down and saved you from this pit. What kind of thankful people should we be! Knowing the depths of our sin only increases the glory of God’s grace, which in turn amplifies our paise of his glorious grace.
4. Be compassionate toward those still dead in their sins. You were once as they are now. It is easy to take offence, to turn away, to give up. I think of children of believers often. They express their depravity every day, and I have to remind myself, “They’re dead in their sins, just like I once was! And unless God intervenes they will not be saved.”
5. Go and preach the gospel. This is the great hope. Don’t rely on the broken staves of human philosophy, psychology, meditation, or any other thing. Only the gospel is the power of God unto salvation.