Ephesians 2:1-10 | Death to Life. Wrath to Poem.Sample

Before and After

Ephesians casts God’s vision for his people. It’s his dream. And by sharing his dream for his people, God shares it for the world.

His dream is that we’d be one with him, and therefore with each other, and therefore live according to that unity.

Ephesians has been described as relentlessly relational. Union with Christ shapes everything. This oneness with Christ is described in all kinds of ways, and all of it flows out of Paul’s favorite phrase, “in Christ.”

Jesus has the power to change us, protect us, and sustain us. We have a new shared identity in him. But the million-dollar question is whether we will embrace and live according to that identity.

So it becomes about change and choice. God changes us. Will we choose to live according to that change?

And here, in Ephesians 2, we start to see the before-and-after difference of that change and choice.

Ephesians is loaded with a series of before-and-after contrasts describing life without God to life in Christ.

• Formerly dead, now alive
• Once children of wrath, but now God’s poem
• Far off to brought near
• Strangers to citizens
• Infancy to maturity
• Old self to new self
• Darkness to light
• Wine-filled to Spirit-filled
• Asleep to awake
• Unwise to wise
• Weakness by dominating to strength through submitting
• On spiritual defense to playing spiritual offense

That’s quite a change!

Here, in Ephesians 2:1-10, we dive into the first two.

Which side of the equation will you embrace and live according to?

Today, read the opening of this amazing and powerful passage. Consider the contrasts and what God has done for you.