Our Spiritual Standing in Christ

I want to encourage my readers to take a new look at their identities. I want us to understand what we have in Christ, believe it, and walk in it. I want to cover two verses of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. It will expose you to something you may need to consider with care.

In Eph 1:13-14, he speaks to Gentile believers. I’m limiting my discussion to these two verses. Most of my readers are Gentiles, making it more relevant to them. However, there is significance to the divide that I will touch on.

First, I’ll cover the backstory. It is significant to have a complete understanding of what Paul is addressing.

In Gen 3:1-7, humankind falls from his mandate. Yahweh created a beautiful garden and the beginnings of a family for himself (Adam and Eve). Death entered the world, and Yahweh kicked them out of paradise. They got separated from God.

In Gen 6:1-4, there is a second fall. This time, the sons of God (spiritual beings) collude and decide to take the daughters of men to themselves. Whether by force or not is hard to tell. The resulting offspring further corrupts fallen mankind. Human depravity accelerates. The sons of God introduce the black arts to humankind. Yahweh starts over with Noah’s flood.

In Gen 11:1-9, humankind begins repopulating the Earth and decides they can “manage” God. Men collude to build a tower to reach Heaven, to bring God down to them so he can do their bidding. God scatters them, establishes geographical borders, and confuses their language. At the same time, they decide they do not want to follow God. Yahweh disinherits the nations and turns them over to the sons of God to rule them. (See Dt 32 & Psa 82).

His disinheritance is a temporary tactic. He decides to start over – again (remember the flood). He immediately calls Abram and Sarai out of Ur of the Chaldees. They are an unlikely couple—he is ancient, and she is barren. But Yahweh is the creator. He resides in Heaven and does what he wants. He makes a covenant with Abram that Yahweh would set aside his offspring from the rest of the world. They would be Yahweh’s people, and He would be their God. They would produce a nation that would bless the world as a whole.

Yahweh will still get everyone together and have his family.

I will skip much of the OT history and get to the resolution. The whole plan culminates with the Son of God incarnating. He reverses the three falls, reconciling mankind to God. He begins building the family Yahweh always planned. This was the second person of the Trinity, not one of the sons of god (created spiritual beings).

The critical point I want to make is twofold:

• The Jews, though chosen, failed in their mandate. They did not bless the whole world because of their lack of loyalty to Yahweh and their idolatry. It resulted in their exile.
• Yahweh disinherits the Gentiles. They are without approach to Yahweh. There were rare exceptions.

When Jesus appeared, he accomplished at least four things:

1. He eliminated the wall of separation between the Jews and Gentiles.
2. He reversed the three falls in Gen 3, 6, and 11.
3. The reconciliation of mankind with God took place.
4. The spiritual family-building began in earnest.

That is where we find ourselves at the time of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. I took the time to summarize the backstory. It illuminates the dire state of affairs when Jesus came to Earth.

The Jews, though chosen by God, lived outside of Canaan throughout the world. Yahweh exiled them because of their idolatry. Even those living in Canaan considered themselves in exile under Roman rule.

Yahweh disinherited the Gentiles. They wanted freedom from him. He gave them over to rule by lesser gods. They had no access or even knowledge of Yahweh. Their gods had completely deluded them and led them away from him.

There was no general access to Yahweh, the Cosmos’ creator. He would have to intervene.

Paul understood all of this. Jesus had solved a myriad of problems. He instructed the believers in Ephesus on how rich the benefit was.

13 In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory. (Eph 1:13–14).

It is a short passage but essential to understanding the true benefit of what Jesus did. He sealed the promise by giving us the Holy Spirit. He is our guarantee.

The “already” is here, and the “not yet” is coming. I grant there is a tension between the “already” and the “not yet.” But we must not deny the “already” because the “not yet” is not fully realized. That tendency is a product of being hyper-literal in our exegesis.

When the inspired author of a New Testament document affirms a truth, we must not reject that truth. If the word of God opposes theological bias, the bias is wrong. The translation to English obscures some of the meaning.  It isn’t because of bad translation. Greek is more nuanced.

Let’s take a deeper Greek grammar dive into these verbs (the action words):

• heard (Greek: akousantes) – VAAP-PNM
• believed (Greek: pisteusantes) – VAAP-PNM
• were sealed – (Greek: sphragizo) – VAPI2P

VAAP-PNM is shorthand for verb, aorist, active, participle, plural, nominative, masculine

VAPI2P is shorthand for verb, aorist, passive, indicative, 2nd person, plural

A mini disclaimer is in order. I am not an expert in Koine Greek, the language of the New Testament. However, I have access to a treasure trove of research resources for looking things up. My analysis of the Greek in the passage comes from my research. The authors are experts. One of them, Bill Mounce, has this recommendation. It is a paraphrase. “Be careful of people who say they are Greek experts.” He would know. Among other things, he was the NT Chair of the ESV translation of the Bible. He serves on the NIV translation committee.

I don’t claim that I am an expert, so it is all the more appropriate for me.

All three verbs are in the aorist tense. That means we should take the action as a completed (perfective) whole. The closest English equivalence is the simple past. However, English has no sense of completion (perfection) attached to the simple past.

The first two verbs are in the active voice. That means you (plural) are/were the actor(s). In other words, you heard and you believed. You completed (perfected) those actions.

The third verb is in the passive voice. That means you were not the actor. Instead, another actor acted upon you (in this case, God). In other words, God sealed you, and His sealing is complete (perfected) in you.

Nothing in Greek indicates that more needs doing. In English, that would require something like, “And there is nothing more that can be or needs doing”

Think about what that means. As a Gentile, you had no access to God – AT ALL. Jesus’ work on your behalf at Calvary completely changed your status with God. Now you have heard and believe. Now, you are adopted into the family of God. You have all inheritance rights afforded to family members. You are so much more than a member of a club that meets on Sunday.

The Cross cleansed you, giving you access to the Father. The Resurrection ratified the truth of the Cross and gave victory over death. The Ascension shifted all authority from the principalities and powers. Jesus is on the throne. They were cast out of Heaven to the Earth, making way for the Holy Spirit to come. The Holy Spirit provided the means (power) to resist sin. You walk in eternal life. The Spirit in you guarantees the rest of the adoption package upon the Day of The Lord, the return of Jesus.

We must draw this conclusion from the original language. It is not readily evident in English.

If you think otherwise and don’t believe it, stop it is scripture. You are reading with either:

• theological system bias,
• creedal tradition bias,
• denominational bias, or
• conventional wisdom bias.

We miss so much that we could see when we read with 21st-century English eyes.  It helps to dig more. We can unpack the full message with 1st-century Greek understanding eyes.

We will not all be scholars, but we can give more of ourselves to knowing God. The study tools are available to anyone interested. The Premium Logos desktop app subscription is only $7.00/month or $70.00/year. You will spend more than that on coffee.