This is part 4 of TBD on Ephesians. I’ll be quickly going through the first three (and last two) chapters of Ephesians to set the context, because we live in age of declining Biblical literacy, and I’ll slow down more when I reach Ephesians 4, because I think we always need more unity and purity.
As we walk through Ephesians 1, we’ve already covered our identity in Christ and some of our blessings in Christ (begun last post, continued in this one), and we will cover our growing knowledge of Christ (next post). This week, we will finish looking at the many blessings we have in Christ, found in Ephesians 1:3-14.
Starting in Ephesians 1:3, Paul’s talks about every spiritual blessing[1] we have in Christ. He’s not including every blessing of every kind, just the spiritual ones. Matthew Henry says God wants us to realize that there are temporal, earthly blessings but that spiritual blessings are better.
Verses 3-5 tell us that we are chosen children of God, but Paul goes on to say that we are also blessed in the following ways: We are redeemed, rich, and secure in Christ.
In verse 7, he says, “In him we have redemption through his blood.” Redemption means “to buy back,” out of bondage. An old hymn says, “He sought us and bought us with his redeeming blood.”[2] Paul equates this redemption with “the forgiveness of our trespasses,” one of the many words for sin.
Sin is a common word, but it may not have a common or universal definition. Unless otherwise noted, I’ll be assuming the Westminster Shorter Catechism’s definition of sin: “Any want (or lack) of conformity unto, or transgression of, the law of God (WSC 14).”
We all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, as Paul says in Romans 3:23. Therefore, we need redemption, a costly forgiveness that would cost Jesus His life.
But praise the Lord, Jesus is rich. He paid for our redemption through the riches of his grace, which He lavished upon us. That is the great, wise, mystery that He’s revealed in Christ – a plan that began in Genesis 3:15 when God promised a snake crusher to defeat Satan, the tempter who dragged Adam and Eve into sin and misery. That plan was fully revealed, thousands of years later, in the fullness of time (Gal 4:4), at just the right time (Rom 5:6), the time when Christ died and rose again for our sins.
In Him, we’re chosen. In love, we’re children. In Him, we’re redeemed, and we’re rich.
Verses 11 says, “In him, we’ve obtained an inheritance.”
Why? Because we were predestined. (If you don’t like that word, take it up with Paul, not me.) We were predestined according to His purpose, who works all things according to the counsel of His will.
This is why we say that God is all-wise and sovereign. He knows what should happen, and He makes it happen. That includes our adoption and our redemption and our inheritance (which is also of particular importance to Jews who first hoped in Christ, before they ever knew the name Jesus).[3]
In him, we’re chosen, children, redeemed, and rich – recipients of an inheritance, and we’re also secure.
Verse 13 says, “In him, when you heard the gospel (or good news) and believed, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, the guarantee of our inheritance.”
You and I were sealed; therefore, we are secure. We have received the Holy Spirit, the guarantee of our inheritance. The ESV footnote says guarantee means, “down payment.” Think about that. The Holy Spirit (who is God Himself, whose presence presents a bazillion blessings to us) is merely the down payment. Down payments guarantee that the rest of the money will come, but down payments aren’t everything, either. If you sell your house next week and the buyer only gives you a down payment, then you will still hope to get the rest of the money that’s promised to you. But God cannot lie, so He will keep His promise. If the down payment is this good (the Holy Spirit Himself, God Himself), then how much better will the full inheritance be?
Those are the benefits that we have in Christ.
We’re chosen, children (last post), redeemed, rich (because our inheritance is waiting), and it is all secured or guaranteed.
This may not erase every problem you have in life, but those problems do not erase these benefits and blessings, either. Tomorrow, you may struggle with anger or lust or jealousy or selfishness or idolatry or something else. But when we approach the Lord’s table, I like to say that this meal is not for perfect people, it’s for penitent[4] (or repentant) sinners who know they need the blood of Jesus to wash away their sins.
In Christ, we are not the sum total of our sins and shortcomings. In Christ, you are a chosen child of God, redeemed by His blood, who is rich, because of your secure inheritance that has been sealed by the Spirit. With blessings that rich, we should want to know this loving God even more, which we’ll cover in our next Ephesians post.
-Pastor Matt, 5-30-25
[1] Cf The benefits that flow from our effectual calling in Westminster Shorter Catechism 32-39.
[2] If you don’t know those words, then you’ve never been a Baptist.
[3] Something that the Jews (the Old Testament people of God) looked to and hoped for, for ages, long before Christ came. It’s why we sing at Christmastime, “Come, thou long-expected Jesus.” Before they knew Jesus’s name, they knew they needed a redeemer to come and give them their promised inheritance.
[4] HT, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: “Only the penitent man shall pass. … The penitent man is humble; he kneels before God.”