Love First Love: But God... / Ephesians 2:1-10
The Question at the Heart of Leadership
Well, church, it is good to see you this week. As you find a seat, Ephesians chapter two is where we are going to be landing. Go ahead and turn there in your Bibles.
While you are turning there, let me just say that one of the distinct privileges I have as a pastor—and really our whole pastoral staff here at The Well—is the opportunity to walk with folks in our congregation and help shepherd them. A unique privilege within that calling is identifying, recruiting, raising up, training, equipping, and unleashing leaders in the church. As we saw last week in Ephesians 1, God’s chosen vessel for transformation, through which Christ rules, reigns, and empowers, is the church. Being part of this process and finding people who are willing to put all their chips in and say, “Man, I want to get after it for the kingdom”—that is an incredible joy.
Whether we are vetting Life Group leaders, coaches, young couples in premarital counseling, worship leaders, or mission trip leaders, there is one question I almost always ask in the interview process: What is the gospel? What is the testimony of your salvation? How did you come to know Jesus Christ?
For those who might be visiting or new to Christianity, the word “gospel” is tossed around quite a bit in church circles, and it appears frequently in the scriptures. It literally means “good news.” The good news of the gospel is the epicenter of the Christian life. It is the foundation of our faith, the foundation of the church, and the center of all meaning.
The good news is simply this: at one point, you and I were alienated from God because of our sin. We were enslaved to our flesh and held in bondage by our enemy, the devil, utterly unable to reconcile ourselves to God. The very wrath of God hung over us. But God did not sit idly by; He entered in. He sent His own Son as the substitute and payment for our sins. Jesus lived the perfect life we could not live, laid His life down on the cross, rose bodily from the dead, and is now seated at the right hand of the Father. When we take the trust we formerly placed in ourselves and place it entirely in Jesus Christ, we receive a salvation that is not earned, but freely given by grace through faith alone. That is the gospel that saves.
Yet, when I sit down with folks—even those who have grown up in church—I am always fascinated by how wildly the answers vary. Typically, I hear one of three flawed answers.
The first is an appeal to Christian heritage. Someone will say, “Well, as far back as I can remember, I’ve grown up in the church. I come from a Christian home.” That is wonderful, but two things are worth noting: first, homes aren’t Christian—people are. Second, I grew up eating McDonald’s, but that doesn’t make me a Big Mac. Growing up in a Christian home does not make you a Christian. That is testifying to family heritage, not the gospel of Jesus.
The second common answer is an appeal to moralism. Someone will say, “I’ve tried to be a good person. If I stood before God, I think He’d let me in because I’ve done more good than bad. I don’t cuss anymore, I don’t get drunk anymore, and I don’t sleep around anymore.” Whenever I hear that, I have to be honest: I have an atheist friend back in Texas who could give that exact same testimony. What is missing from that equation is Jesus. In a moralistic testimony, the hero of the story is not Jesus Christ; the hero is the person trying to clean themselves up so God will pick them for His team.
The third answer is an appeal to religion. “I go to church, I read my Bible, I was baptized when I was five, and I listen to K-LOVE.” Those practices are good, but ceremonial rites do not equate to salvation.
In all three of those answers, the true gospel is nowhere to be found. None of those things can save a human soul. If that is your testimony, you are trusting in a gospel of works, and the wrath of God remains upon you.
Today, in Ephesians chapter two, we are going to look at the fourth answer: the gospel according to God through His Word. If you have genuinely placed your trust in Jesus Christ, these ten verses represent your true testimony.
You Were Dead: The True Starting Point
Paul begins in verse one by showing us what could never save us, and he explains why your heritage, your morality, and your religion are powerless.
Ephesians 2:1 (NASB)
And you were dead in your trespasses and sins,
Paul tells us that every human testimony begins in the graveyard of spiritual death. He is not talking about physical death or reincarnation. He is describing spiritual death—the reality that from the womb forward, our minds, wills, affections, and hearts were entirely desensitized to God. Left to ourselves, we wanted nothing to do with Him.
If you have spent time around dead people lately, you know they are not easy to befriend. Dead means dead. They cannot talk, they cannot respond, and they cannot raise themselves back to life. No matter how much they might wish otherwise, they are completely powerless. Paul says the exact same thing is true of us spiritually.
In theology, we call this total depravity. It does not mean we are as evil as we could possibly be—that would be utter depravity. Total depravity means that every faculty of our being is stained by sin, leaving us completely unable to remedy our broken condition.
How did we end up dead? Paul writes that you were dead in your “trespasses and sins.” This is Garden of Eden language. Our spiritual condition was set thousands of years ago in Genesis. God created humanity in His image for relationship, placed Adam in the garden, and told him he could eat from any tree except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God warned that on the day he ate of it, he would surely die. That relationship was built on trusting God’s character. When Adam and Eve deviated from trust and ate the fruit, judgment fell, resulting in both physical mortality and immediate spiritual death.
To “trespass” means to cross a boundary you were forbidden to cross. If someone trespasses into my house at two in the morning, they are going to meet my friends Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson. They have crossed a line. “Sin,” on the other hand, is an ancient archery term. When an archer released an arrow at a target and missed the bullseye—even by a fraction of an inch—the judge would call out, “Sin!” It means to miss the mark. Adam committed an act of commission (trespass) and an act of omission (sin).
Because God is a just Judge, He must punish sin. No judge in California would remain on the bench if he let murderers and chronic lawbreakers walk away without consequence. God’s justice demanded that sin be dealt with.
Furthermore, sin is not merely something we do; it is what we are by nature.
Romans 5:12 (NASB)
Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned–
Psalms 51:5 (NASB)
Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, And in sin my mother conceived me.
Like an infectious disease, spiritual death spread to every descendant of Adam. We were born spiritually dead.
The Threefold Bondage of the Walking Dead
In verses two and three, Paul reveals that spiritual death manifests itself in three distinct ways.
Ephesians 2:2-3 (NASB)
in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.
First, we walked according to the course of this world. This refers to the broken, carnal world system that attempts to operate completely apart from God. We were naturally wired to follow that pattern.
Last night at 11:00 PM, I was sound asleep when I suddenly heard screaming. My three young daughters had decided to throw an impromptu slumber party, and I walked in to find one daughter pulling another daughter’s hair. Where did they learn to do that? They didn’t watch me do that to their mom. They were born with it. Nobody has to teach a child how to sin; we come out of the womb wired for self-centered rebellion.
Second, we were in bondage to the prince of the power of the air—Satan himself. When Satan rebelled, he was cast down, and this fallen world became his temporary domain. He exerts his demonic influence to keep people marching in disobedience.
John 8:44 (NASB)
’You are of [your] father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own [nature], for he is a liar and the father of lies.
If your faith is not in Jesus Christ, your functional king is the enemy of God.
Third, we were enslaved to the lusts of our flesh. Christian and non-Christian alike live in fallen bodies, but apart from the Spirit of God, a person is utterly powerless against carnal desires.
Galatians 5:19-21 (NASB)
Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
This explains why our world is so broken. We look at wars, natural disasters, broken families, addictions, depression, and violence, and everyone agrees the world is fractured. But we disagree on the cure. We have advanced tremendously in science, technology, therapy, medicine, and politics, yet the world remains deeply broken. Why? Because we misdiagnose the problem. We apply cosmetic band-aids to symptoms instead of dealing with the root: the human heart dead in sin. The answer to man’s problem cannot be found in man. We cannot rescue ourselves. We need an outside Savior.
But God: The Turning Point of Grace
If the Bible stopped at verse three, Christianity would be the most depressing message on earth. Imagine the sermon: “Welcome to church. You are spiritually dead, enslaved to the devil, powerless to fix yourself, and under God’s eternal wrath. Have a great week, see you next Sunday!” It would be completely hopeless.
That is why verse four contains the two most glorious words in Scripture.
Ephesians 2:4 (NASB)
But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us,
Notice what the text does not say. It does not say, “But you figured it out,” or “But your good works kicked in,” or “But your religion saved you.” You could not save yourself because corpses cannot perform CPR on themselves.
In modern Christianity, we often reduce salvation to a “divine assist.” People use the analogy of a drowning person flailing in the ocean, and God tossing a life preserver labeled Jesus—leaving it up to the swimmer to grab on and paddle to safety. In the nineteenth century, Charles Spurgeon rightly called that a terrible illustration. Ephesians 2 does not say you were drowning; it says you were dead. You were not doggy-paddling; you were lying lifeless on the ocean floor. A corpse cannot grab a life preserver.
Salvation requires God Himself to plunge into the depths of the ocean, enter our humanity, pick up our lifeless bodies, and breathe His own resurrection life into our lungs.
Why would God do that? Was it because you were so impressive or moral that He looked down the corridors of time and said, “I’ve got to get that guy on My team”? Absolutely not.
Conversely, some of you are sitting here thinking, “Why would God ever save me? If you knew what I did last night or how dirty I feel, you’d know God could never love me.” Listen to me: God’s decision to step in had nothing to do with your performance, good or bad.
He stepped in because He is “rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us.” There is nothing you can do to make God love you any more, and nothing you can do to make Him love you any less, because His love is anchored in His character, not your performance.
Romans 5:8 (NASB)
But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
God did not wait for you to take a shower before He gave you a bath. He saved you right in the middle of your mess.
Made Alive, Raised, and Seated
Look at how God accomplished this rescue in verses five and six.
Ephesians 2:5-6 (NASB)
even when we were dead in our transgressions, 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,
The phrase “made us alive” is the most emphatic verb in the passage. God took the initiative. Because the penalty for sin is death, we needed a sinless substitute to pay our debt. Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, took on human flesh, lived the perfect life we failed to live, and absorbed the full wrath of God on the cross.
In that moment, the Great Exchange occurred: God placed our sin upon Jesus and credited Christ’s perfect righteousness to our account. Through faith, we are made alive in Him.
Furthermore, the gospel does not stop at the cross. Jesus did not just forgive your past; He gave you a brand-new life through His resurrection. The same power that brought Jesus out of the grave now lives inside of you to transform your daily life.
And positionally, Paul says we are already “seated with Him in the heavenly places.” Now, I know you are sitting in Fresno right now, but spiritually, your salvation is so secure in Christ that God views your seat in glory as an accomplished reality. Jesus has defeated sin, Satan, and death, and His victory is entirely yours.
John 14:6 (NASB)
Jesus said to him, ’I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.
Why did God orchestrate salvation this way?
Ephesians 2:7 (NASB)
so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
God saved you by sheer grace so that for all eternity, He could put His overflowing kindness on display through your transformed life.
Saved by Grace, Created for Good Works
Paul summarizes this glorious truth in verses eight and nine.
Ephesians 2:8-9 (NASB)
For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, [it is] the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.
If you could contribute even one percent to your salvation, grace would cease to be grace, and you would share the glory with God.
Imagine I told you that there is a brand-new BMW out in the parking lot with your name on the title. You run outside, see the keys, and say, “Pastor, this is incredible, but I can’t just take it. Let me give you $2,000.” I say, “No, it’s a free gift.” You say, “How about $200?” “No, don’t insult me.” Finally you say, “At least let me give you a single penny!”
If I take that penny, for the rest of your life you can brag, “I bought that car with the pastor.” By making salvation entirely a gift of grace, God excludes all human boasting. Jesus paid the entire price.
So what are we saved for?
Ephesians 2:10 (NASB)
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
The Greek word for “workmanship” is poiēma, from which we get our English word “poem.” Your redeemed life is God’s masterpiece, a living sonnet declaring His relentless grace to a watching world. In the Garden of Eden, Adam’s original purpose was to glorify God through his work. Sin corrupted that purpose, but in Christ, our calling is fully restored. We are saved not by good works, but for good works.
Your testimony can be summarized in three phrases from this chapter:
- You were dead (v. 1)
- But God (v. 4)
- We are His workmanship (v. 10)
If you have never placed your trust in Jesus Christ—if you have been relying on your Christian heritage, your moral track record, or your religious rituals—I invite you today to stop trusting yourself. Transfer your trust completely to the finished work of Jesus Christ.
A Call to Respond at the Lord’s Table
For those of us who belong to Christ, the only proper response to this passage is worship and gratitude. We are going to respond right now by coming to the Lord’s Table.
1 Corinthians 11:23-26 (NASB)
For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, ‘This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’ In the same way [He took] the cup also after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink [it], in remembrance of Me.’ For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.
To the watching world, communion can seem unusual. There is nothing magical in these physical elements. Taking communion does not save you; rather, it is a tangible proclamation of the gospel.
When you come to the tables, take the bread and remember that Christ’s body was broken as your substitute. When you dip the bread into the cup, remember that His blood was poured out to purchase the complete forgiveness of your sins.
Let us pray together.
Father, we thank You for the gospel of Jesus Christ. Thank You that when we were dead, You stepped in with rich mercy and great love. As we take these elements, we do not celebrate our achievements; we celebrate what Christ has accomplished on our behalf. May Your gospel be proclaimed through our lives until Jesus returns. In His precious name we pray. Amen.