Mystery of election.—Those who are willing are always the elect; those who will not are not elected. Many men are wrapped up in the doctrines of election and predestination; but that is the height of impertinence. They are truths belonging to God alone; and if you are perplexed by them, it is only because you trouble yourself about things which do not concern you. You only need to know that God sustains you with all His might in the winning of your salvation if you will only rightly use His help. Whoever doubts this is like a crew of a boat working with all their might against the tide and yet going back hour after hour; then they notice that the tide turns, while at the same time the wind springs up and fills their sails. The coxswain cries, “Pull away, boys! wind and tide favour you!” But they answer, “What can we do with the oars? don’t the wind and tide take away our free agency?”—H. W. Beecher.
Ver. 3. Spiritual Blessings.
I. They are accommodated to our spiritual wants and desires, they come down from heaven, prepare us for heaven, and will be completed in our admission to heaven.—The influences of the Spirit are heavenly gifts, the renovation of the heart by a Divine operation is wisdom from above, the renewed Christian is born from above and becomes a spiritual man, the state of immortality Christ has purchased for believers is an inheritance reserved for them in heaven, in the resurrection they will be clothed with a house from heaven, with spiritual and heavenly bodies, and they will sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.
II. The blessings granted to the Ephesians are tendered to us.—He offers us the honours and felicities of adoption and the remission of all our sins through the atonement of His Son. He has proposed for our acceptance an inheritance incorruptible in the heavens. We have happier advantages to become acquainted with the doctrines and precepts of the Gospel than the primitive Christians could enjoy. If they were bound to give thanks for their privileges, how criminal must be ingratitude under ours! We must one day answer before God for all the spiritual blessings He has sent us.—Lathrop.
Vers. 4–6. The Nature, Source, and Purposes of Spiritual Blessings.
I. God chose and predestinated these Ephesian Christians before the foundation of the world.—We must not so conceive of God’s election and the influence of His grace as to set aside our free agency and final accountableness; nor must we so explain away God’s sovereignty and grace as to exalt man to a state of independence. Now, so far as the grace of God in the salvation of sinners is absolute and unconditional, election or predestination is so, and no farther. If we consider election as it respects the final bestowment of salvation, it is plainly conditional. To imagine that God chooses some to eternal life without regard to their faith and holiness is to suppose that some are saved without these qualifications or saved contrary to His purpose. God hath chosen us to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth.
II. Consider the spiritual qualifications to which the Ephesians were chosen.—“To be holy and without blame before Him in love” (ver. 4). Holiness consists in the conformity of the soul to the Divine nature and will and is opposed to all moral evil. Love is a most essential part of the character of the saint. Charity out of a pure heart is the end of the commandment. Without charity all our pretensions to Gospel holiness are vain.
III. Consider the adoption to which believers are predestinated (ver. 5).—Our sonship is not our native right, but the effect of God’s gracious adoption. 1. It implies a state of freedom in opposition to bondage. Believers are free as being delivered from the bondage of sin, and as having near access to God and intimate communion with Him. Children are usually admitted to that familiar intercourse which is denied to servants. 2. Adoption brings us under the peculiar care of God’s providence. 3. Includes a title to a glorious resurrection from the dead and to an eternal inheritance in the heavens. If believers are the children of God, then their temper must be a childlike temper, a temper corresponding to their relation, condition, and character.
IV. That all spiritual blessings are derived to us through Christ (vers. 5, 6).
V. The reason of God’s choosing believers in Christ and predestinating them to adoption is the good pleasure of His will (ver. 5).—If we admit we are sinful, fallen creatures, unworthy of God’s favour and insufficient for our own redemption, then our salvation must ultimately be resolved into God’s good pleasure. There is no other source from which it can be derived. If death is our desert, our deliverance must be by grace.