In this message we come to Eph. 2. We have seen that there is no mention of God’s mercy in chapter one because everything there is excellent. But chapter two describes a miserable situation, a situation that requires the rich mercy of God. In this message we shall be concerned with the first three verses of chapter two.
Actually, Ephesians 2 is not mainly concerned with the pitiful situation of fallen man, but with the producing and building of the church. At the end of chapter one, we see the church as the Body of Christ being produced out of the transmission of the ascended Christ. This is the church seen from the positive view, the view from the top. But we must see not only the view from the top, but also the view from the bottom. In chapter one Paul looks at the church from the viewpoint of the heavenlies. From this perspective, the church is the issue of the transmission of the ascended Christ. But in chapter two Paul looks at the church from the bottom, the church from the viewpoint of the miserable situation of fallen man.
Ephesians 2:1 says, “And you, being dead in your offenses and sins.” According to grammar, “and” indicates that the last sentence of chapter one is not completed. The last verse of chapter one reveals that the church, the Body of Christ, has been produced by Christ through His attainment. Now chapter two unveils the background, the realm of death, from which the church has been brought forth.
In chapter one the Apostle Paul speaks many excellent things. He says that the church comes into being through the wonderful transmission of the ascended Christ. In chapter one Paul talks about Christ and the power that operated in Christ in raising Him from the dead, in seating Him in the heavenlies far above all, in subjecting all things under His feet, and in giving Him to be the Head over all things to the church, which is His Body, the fullness of the One who fills all in all. But as we have pointed out, there is another side to the church. There is the side of Christ, and there is also the side of ourselves. Therefore, in 2:1 Paul says, “And you.” The church has not only the aspect of divinity, but also the aspect of humanity. In chapter one we see that the church is the issue of divinity transmitted into us. In chapter two we see that the church comes out of humanity. The conjunction “and” at the beginning of 2:1 is significant in bringing together these two aspects of the church.
Verse 1 says that we were dead in our offenses and sins. The words “being dead” refer to the dead condition of our spirit, a death that pervades our entire being. We were not only fallen and sinful; we were dead.
As I was preaching the gospel in Shanghai on New Year’s Day in 1947, I said to the people, “Friends, we Christian preachers must be honest and tell people what their real situation is. You are not only sinners — all of you are dead. You are all in a coffin and in a tomb. You may regard yourselves as cultured ladies and gentlemen, but actually you are dead and buried in a tomb. I tell you this because now Christ wants to make you alive and raise you up out of your coffin.” This is a good way to preach the gospel.
Because the book of Romans deals with sinners, it does not emphasize the fact that fallen people are dead. Instead, the emphasis in Romans is upon sins and sin. But the emphasis in the book of Ephesians is on death, on dealing with dead people. The salvation revealed in Romans is salvation according to righteousness. According to Romans 1:16 and 17, the gospel of God is powerful unto salvation because God’s righteousness is revealed in it. In Romans God saves us by, through, and with His righteousness. In Ephesians, however, God saves the dead with life. Righteousness does not benefit the dead ones. What they need is life. Many Christians are not clear about the difference between salvation through righteousness and salvation through life. For this reason, they use Ephesians to illustrate salvation through righteousness. As sinners and dead people, we needed both righteousness and life, both the salvation in Romans and the salvation in Ephesians.
By being dead in offenses and sins, we lost the function that enables us to contact God. Spiritual death has annulled the function of our spirit. No matter how active we were in our body and soul, we were deadened in our spirit, unable to contact God.
Verse 1 says that we were dead in our offenses and sins. Offenses are acts that overstep the limit of right, and sins are evil doings. It was from such a background of death in our offenses and sins that we were saved to be the church, the Body. The dead have been made alive to be a living organism to express Christ.
We need to say a further word about offenses. In running a race you must stay within the lines. To go outside the lines is to commit an offense. You have the right to run within the lines, but if you run outside the lines, you overstep your rights.
Years ago, I was helped by a certain brother who had been learning the lessons of life. One day he testified that, after having been enlightened by God, he realized that if he knocked at someone’s door and no one answered, he had no right to enter the room. To do so would be to overstep his rights. I was greatly helped by this testimony. Thereafter, whenever I visited someone’s home, I limited myself to the room in which I had been asked to be seated. I did not presume to walk around in other parts of the house. To do that would be to overstep my rights and commit an offense. Others, however, may think nothing of walking through someone’s home and even of examining the various things there. Although they may justify their behavior, in the eyes of God they are overstepping their rights.
Suppose after the meeting a brother leaves his hymnal on a chair. Do you think you have the right to handle it? No, you do not have this right, unless you are responsible to clean the hall or to collect lost items for lost and found. Even if you do have the responsibility to pick up items in the meeting hall, this does not mean that you have the right to look through the brother’s hymnal.
In the eyes of God, we have overstepped our rights many times. Hence, we were those dead in our offenses. Furthermore, we were also dead in sins, in evil doings such as lying and stealing.
Referring to our offenses and sins, verse 2 says, “In which you once walked according to the age of this world.” “This world” refers to the satanic system composed of many ages. The word “age” here refers to a part, a section, an aspect, of the system of Satan, particularly the present and modern appearance of that system, which is used by him to usurp and occupy people and keep them away from God and His purpose. When we were dead in offenses and sins, we walked according to the age, the modern appearance, the present course, of the world, the satanic system.
All the time that we were dead in offenses and sins, we were very active in the world, in the realm of the satanic kingdom. The Greek word translated “world,” cosmos, means a system. This is neither a divine nor a human system; rather, it is a satanic system. This system, the world, is composed of many ages, each of which is a section of the satanic system. Every age is also a course. For this reason, the King James Version adopts the rendering “the course of this world.” Every age has a certain style and appearance. The world appeared to Abraham in one way, to David in another way, and to Paul in still another way. Today the world also has its modern appearance. Furthermore, the age of the world has a tide with a current. Once we walked according to the current of the present age. When people follow the trend of the age, this is a strong sign that they are dead, that they are corpses carried along by the current of the age.
I saw an excellent illustration of this when I was traveling through the interior of China in 1937. One day I passed by a creek which flowed down the slope of a hill. The creek was full of dead leaves that were being swept along with the current. Among the leaves some little fish were swimming upstream against the current. Because the fish were full of life, they could swim against the current; but because the leaves were lifeless, they could only be carried away by the current. They did not have the life to withstand the current and go against it. As long as anyone follows the present current of the world, he is dead. The reason the current of the age can carry so many people along with it is that they all are dead. Throughout the world, in every country, the people are dead. Therefore, whenever the tide of the age comes in, they are swept along by it immediately. Once we also were dead and carried away by the tide of the age, but now that we have been made alive, the current cannot move us.
When we were dead in our offenses and sins, we were not only active in following the age of this world; we also walked “according to the ruler of the authority of the air, of the spirit who is now operating in the sons of disobedience.” The ruler here refers to Satan, the prince of the aerial authority mentioned in 6:12. The spirit, in apposition with “the authority of the air,” refers to the aggregate power, a personal aggregate of all the evil angelic authorities, over which Satan is the ruler. This aggregate spirit is now operating in the sons of disobedience. But we, who once were sons of disobedience, have been saved to be the church.
Above us there is the sphere ruled by Satan, the ruler of the authority of the air. Not many Christians have an adequate understanding of this evil power in the air. The entire earth is under the domination of this spirit in the air. This evil spirit, this evil atmosphere, is the cause of crimes, murders, and even suicides. It influences people to do evil things which, as humans, they would not normally do. The source of this evil is in the spirit, the atmosphere, which dominates them. This spirit is now operating in the sons of disobedience, in those who are disobedient to God.
We have considered two of the realms in which we were active when we were dead in our offenses and sins — the realm of the world and the realm of the aerial authority. Now we need to consider the third realm — the realm of the lusts of our flesh. Verse 3 says, “Among whom also we all behaved ourselves once in the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the thoughts, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.” The word “whom” in this verse refers to the sons of disobedience, and the word “we” refers to all believers, both Jewish and Gentile. When we were dead in our offenses and sins, we also behaved according to the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires not only of the flesh but also of the thoughts. Three evil things, the age of this world outside of us, the ruler of the aerial authority above and within us, and the lusts of our flesh in our fallen nature, dominated our life. From these evil things we have been saved to become the Body of Christ.
Before we were saved, we all behaved ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, doing whatever the flesh and the thoughts liked to do. The word “desires” in verse 3 refers to our likes. In the past, we did certain things simply because we liked to do them. If we liked to go dancing, we went dancing. If we liked to attend sporting events, we attended them. If we liked window shopping, we went window shopping. Today’s young generation, probably more than any generation in history, does whatever it likes. If you ask the young people why they do certain things, many of them would answer that they simply like to do them. This is a sure sign of a dead person. In doing whatever they like, many of today’s young people are like cars without brakes. How dangerous this is!
The likes of the flesh in verse 3 refer to evil things, and the likes of the thoughts refer to things that may be somewhat better. But both are a sign of being deadened in the spirit, especially in the conscience. When someone is deadened in his spirit, he does whatever his flesh and his thoughts like to do.
In verse 3 Paul says that we were “by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.” We, as the sons of disobedience, were also the children of wrath. In the realm of death we were under God’s wrath because of our disobedience. But we have been saved both from our disobedience and from God’s wrath.
We have seen three realms in which we once were active: the age of the world, the evil atmosphere around the inhabited earth, and the lusts of our flesh, including the desires of the flesh and of the mind. The world is outside of us, the lusts are within us, and the evil spiritual atmosphere is both above us and within us. It is impossible for dead people to escape from these three realms. By nature, all men are sons of disobedience and children of wrath, under God’s judgment. When we were dead in offenses and sins, this was our condition as well. Praise the Lord that the church has been brought forth from such a realm of death! We have been saved to become the Body of Christ. Now we are no longer in these three realms; instead, we are in Christ, in the Spirit, and in the heavenlies.
Ephesians 2:1-3 gives a clear description of our condition according to our fallen nature. When we were in that condition, we were dead in offenses and sins, yet very active in the age of the world, under the domination of the atmosphere of the air, and in the desires of the flesh and of the thoughts. This is the black background over against which we see the church. The church has been brought forth out of such a miserable source. Hallelujah, although we were dead and in such a deplorable condition, we have been saved to become the Body of Christ! What a salvation!
