Brief Exposition of Galatians and Ephesians, Exposition 2 · Chapter 2 · Verse and explication 1
Vers. 1. ANd you hath He quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins.
THe Apostle (being yet further, to establish those Ephesians in the doctrine of salvation by free grace in Christ, and for this end, to set forth the happinesse of that estate, in which free grace had placed them) sheweth the misery of their former estate before conversion, even that they were dead not naturally, but spiritually; there being nothing of that spiritual life in them which consisteth in the union of the soul with God, Joh. 5. 40. and in a vertue and power of the soul, flowing from this union, to do those things which are spiritually good, and acceptable unto God, Joh. 15. 5. even as the natural life consisteth in the union of the soul with the body, whereby the man is inabled to move, speak, and do such other actions as are competent to that life, so that their spiritual deadnesse doth speak a separation from God, Psal 53. 3. and total inability to do any thing which is spiritually good, Rom. 8 7. The efficient and formall cause of which death he sheweth to have been their sins and trespasses: whereby under two words used indifferently in Scripture to expresse one and the same thing, and both of them in the plural number, is set forth the multitude of sins under which they lay in this their dead condition, as their original sin, their actual sins, sins of omission, commission, and especially their manifold idolatries, which are chiefly pointed at, as those sins, wherein, not only the Ephesians, but the world in general did wallow before Christ came in the flesh, Act. 17. 29, 30. Hence Learn, 1. It is not sufficient that the Servants of Jesus Christ do only preach priviledges, and hold-forth unto Believers that happy estate unto which they are lifted-up through Christ; It is necessary also, that joyntly herewith, they be calling them to minde their wofull, miserable and lost estate by nature; that, the one being set foregainst the other, both may more clearly appear in their own colours, and that those dangerous rocks of growing vain because of what they now are (2 Cor. 12. 7.) and of turning discouraged and diffident, because of what they once were (Psal. 25. 7.) may be eschewed: for, the Apostle, in the preceeding chapter, having spoken much of those high priviledges unto which the Ephesians were advanced by Christ, he doth here minde them of that miserable state wherein God found them; And you who were dead in sins and trespasses. 2. There is nothing contributeth more to commend the doctrine of free grace to peoples consciences, and so to commend it, as to make them closely adhere unto it, both in profession and practice, than the serious perpending of mans wofull, and altogether hopelesse estate by nature: This alone would do much to scatter all that mist, whereby humane reason doth obscure the beauty of this truth, by extolling man's free will as a co-worker with grace, Rom. 3. 19, 20. and would necessitate the lost sinner to imbrace it, and to venture his otherwise hopelesse salvation upon it, 1 Tim. 1. 15. for this is the Apostle's scope through this whole Chapter, even, from the consideration of the wofull estate of those Ephesians before conversion, to illustrate this doctrine of salvation by free grace, and to confirm them in it; And you who were dead in sins and trespasses. 3. Believers in Jesus Christ are not to look upon their lost and miserable estate by nature separately, and apart from, but joyntly with, God's free grace and mercy, which hath delivered them from that misery; for otherwise the thoughts of sin and misery may, if God should give way, swallow them up, Mat. 27. 4, 5. Hence is it the Apostle hath so contrived his discourse here, that allalongs, while he speaketh of their misery in the first three verses, the mind of the Reader is kept in suspense without coming to the perfect close of a sentence, untill God's mercy in their delivery from this misery be mentioned, ver. 5. for, the Original hath not these words, he hath quickened, in this verse: but the Translators have taken them from ver. 5. to make up the sense, without suspending the Reader so long untill he should find them in their own proper place; And you who were dead, &c. 4. Every man by nature, and before conversion, is dead, not to sin, (for that is proper to the Regenerate only. See Rom. 6. 2. where the grammatical construction is the same in the Original with that which is here; only the sense is much different) but in sin, whereby he is wholly deprived of all ability and power to convert himself, Rom. 9. 16. or to do any thing which is spiritually good, Rom. 8. 7. for, while he saith, the Ephesians were dead in sins, before God did quicken them, he speaketh of a thing common to them with others, and therefore he reckoneth himself and the other believing Jews with them, ver. 3. And you who were dead in sins. 5. As the fountaincause of this spiritual death was Adam's sin, in whom all have sinned, Rom. 5. 12. through the merit of whose sin imputed to us, we are deprived of original righteousness, Rom. 7. 18. and a perverse inclination unto all evil hath come in its place, Gen. 6. 5. So every mans own particular actual sins do lay him lower under this state of death, and make his delivery from it more difficult, Jer. 13. 23. for, saith he, Ye were dead in sins and trespasses: under which are comprehended, as we shew, both their original and actual sins.