In this captivating episode of Expository Truths, Dr. John Kyle delves deep into the transformative power of Ephesians 2:4-7. Join us as we uncover the richness of God’s mercy and explore the profound love that He showers upon His believers, making the dead alive in Christ. Through a detailed examination, listeners gain insight into the doctrine of regeneration and its implications for Christians today. Discover how God’s agape love is specific and unwavering, setting believers apart in His eternal grace.
Welcome to Expository Truths, where we exalt Christ by bringing clarity of truth through the scriptures with Dr. John Kyle, pastor of Faith Community Church in Vacaville. As Christians, we’re called to know the truth and be able to proclaim it. We can know truth when we know the Word of God, which is precise, without error, powerful and effective for both salvation and spiritual growth. Enjoy digging deeply with Dr. Kyle as he takes us verse by verse through the powerful book of Ephesians, giving us a marvelous summary of the good news of Christ and its implications for our daily lives.
SPEAKER 01 :
Please turn in your Bibles to Ephesians chapter 2, verses 4 through 7. Ephesians 2, 4 through 7. The letter of Ephesians was written by the Apostle Paul to the faithful saints living in the city of Ephesus. Paul wrote this while he was under house arrest in Rome in about AD 62, and he wrote it to lay a proper doctrinal foundation for these believers so they could then live out those doctrines for the glory of God. We’re now in the doctrinal section of this book that’s found in chapters 1 through 3. And it’s very interesting because this doctrinal section begins with two very, very long sentences. One that’s 12 verses long that’s filled with praise to our amazing God. And the other is a prayer that’s 9 verses long. And that’s chapter 1. What a chapter. What a chapter. Chapter 2 begins by telling us what we once were before we came to Christ. And what was that? Anybody remember? Remember? Dead, right? We were dead. But now we come to the good news. Let’s look at that, verse 4. But God… But God, who is rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ by grace you have been saved, and raised us up together and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace and his kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. Now remember from the previous three verses that everyone is born physically alive, but spiritually dead. And look, before Christ saved the Ephesians and us, we too were dead, and we live like those who were spiritually dead. walking in the ways of this fallen world, following after Satan who owned us, disobeying God and His perfect ways, and generally living like the unsaved, according to the lust of the flesh and not according to the Spirit. But now look, verse 4, but God. And that changes everything. But God. So there’s hope for us here. The word but introduces a contrast, and oh, what a contrast this is. It contrasts the wretched description of an unbeliever with the glorious description of the true believer. So just one three-letter conjunction changes absolutely everything. I mean, our salvation hangs entirely on those two words, but God. We were dead, but God. We were enslaved, but God. We were trapped, but God. We were self-destructing, but God. We were lost in sin, but God. We were children of wrath and deserving of an eternity in the torments of hell, but God. It’s absolutely incredible. So what about him? Look, he’s rich in mercy. And that’s a very good thing for us, right? Rich speaks of wealth, abundance, overflow. And of having more than enough. Of what? Of mercy. Mercy is the outward manifestation of pity. The word indicates the emotion that’s aroused by someone in need and also the attempt to relieve the one who is in need and remove his trouble. So someone’s suffering. Someone is struggling. Someone is facing some kind of calamity in life and mercy feels intensely for that person who is suffering, is deeply concerned for that person who is suffering. and then seeks to do something to alleviate that pain and that trouble of that person who’s suffering. Good for us, because apart from Christ, we’re all in dire and eternal trouble. We are spiritually dead and heading for hell and eternal wrath because of our sin, and what we first need is a God who cares, right? We need a God who has some pity and mercy and some compassion, and guess what? That’s exactly what our God has. And not just a little bit of mercy, no, but an abundance of mercy. Now, Scripture is very clear that God is immutable. That means that God doesn’t change. But does that mean that God doesn’t have true feelings, true affections, true emotions for us as children? No, He does, and those are very real. That said, God is impassable, which simply means that God’s affections and emotions don’t come upon Him as ours come upon us, which is a very good thing. Instead, they are deliberate expressions of His holy dispositions, and they are very real. See, biblically, God isn’t cold, distant, and uncaring, and neither is God surprised by anything that happens. Look, God is never, ever the victim of circumstance. God never loses control. God never flies off the handle or has mood swings. No, God is unchanging. And God is sovereign. But don’t let that truth make you think that God doesn’t care for you. And that that care for you isn’t real. Because it is. It’s very, very real. And it flows out of His heart of love for us as children. And it’s perfect. A similar word for mercy is the word compassion. That word reveals a lot. See, the Greek word for compassion literally means inward parts. The idea is that God’s compassion for His people is something that just wells up from deep within Him. Talking about deep feelings of intense caring, and clearly it’s real. And again, while God is sovereign, and while God is never taken by surprise, look, His feelings of love and compassion and mercy are very real towards us in a perfect way. And that pity and mercy that God has for us as children is not only real, but it leads Him to action. One trusted commentator defines mercy as the self-moved, spontaneous, loving kindness of God, which causes Him to deal in compassion and tender affection with the miserable and the distressed. Isn’t that good? I mean, that’s us. Especially in light of what the previous verses revealed about us apart from Christ. Preacher Thomas Bradbury said, God is never at a loss to help and comfort His weak and weary, tried and tempted, oppressed and suffering people. All God’s children are dear to Him, pleasant in His eyes, and the delight of His heart. That’s right, and that is very important for us to realize. Our God is a merciful God. Our God is rich in mercy, and he cares deeply for us. In Jonah 4.2, Jonah is angry because God’s so merciful to people that Jonah hated. Jonah said, I know that you’re gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abundant in loving kindness, one who relents from doing harm. Jonah was right, and I’m very grateful for that. Anybody? Micah 7.18 says, who is a God like you? Pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgressions of the remnant of his heritage. He does not retain his anger forever because he delights in mercy. That’s our God. 2 Corinthians 1.3 says that God is a father of mercy and the God of all comfort. Psalm 86.5, for you, Lord, are good and ready to forgive. You are abundant in mercy to all those who call upon you. That’s our God. And I’m very grateful for that. Look, we are spiritually dead. We were. We’re pitiful, we’re lost in sin, we’re desperate, we’re needy, and in need of a God who is rich and abundant in mercy. And guess what? Our God is rich and abundant in mercy. That’s true good news. That’s amazing news. That’s shocking news because we don’t deserve it. What else do we learn about God regarding us, His people? This, He displays great love toward us. Look, he’s rich in mercy because what? Because of his great love with which he loved us, oh, that this truth would sink deeply into our heads and into our hearts today. Think about it. Like the Ephesians, we were dead, right? He said that. We were rebels. We belonged to Satan. We were enemies of God, and we were objects of wrath. And it’s in that wretched context that God purposefully set his love on us, his enemies, on rebellious sinners like us. Note that the us there is very specific. Paul is clearly talking about Christians, those who have been made alive. He’s talking about true believers. So that brings up a question, actually, too. First, does God love everyone? And then second, does God love everyone the same? Let’s look. We know from Scripture that God is compassionate, kind, generous, and good, even to those who who are most stubborn and rebellious against Him. Who can deny that those mercies flow out of God’s boundless love? God’s very nature is to love. And the reason our Lord commanded us to love our enemies is so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven, for He causes a son to rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.” So Jesus clearly characterized His Father as one who loves even those who purposefully set themselves at enmity against Him. Yes, Psalms says that God is angry with the wicked all the day, but that anger doesn’t have to negate the general love that God displays towards them. So yeah, God has a general love for humanity. Theologians call it common grace. And that’s seen in his gracious acts of mercy and goodness and patience and so on when he certainly could. I mean, to those who hate him. I mean, think about this. God doesn’t immediately punish people for their sin. He should, right? I mean, he could, right? Better said, he could. God gives those who hate him many joys in life, beautiful mountains, chocolate pie, friends and family, many blessings that every person experiences, even those who hate him, even those who curse him. That’s his love. That’s his common grace on display. That leads to the second question, does God love everyone the same? No. Instead, God loves believers with a particular love, with an infinite, agape, eternal, and saving love that seeks us out and keeps us in, which is different than the general love and goodness that God has for humanity. We should be able to get a grasp on this as we think about the love that we have for our own children. It’s not the same love that we have for other children. No, it’s a family love. It’s a different love. And God’s love for us as His children is like that, right? It’s a covenant love. It’s an eternal love. It’s a saving love. And so God’s love is clearly different in the breadth and depth and manner of its expression towards us, specifically His children. We are His beloved, see, His chosen, His bride. There’s a big difference there. The word used for love here is the Greek word agape. This kind of love is a specific love for Christians, for this speaks of God’s unconditional, sacrificial, covenant love. One said, agape love speaks of a love called out of one’s heart by the preciousness of the one loved. This kind of love is specific for Christians only, for the beloved of God, for his children that he purposefully and specifically died to save for us. Note how Paul says that God’s love for us is great, and don’t we know it? Anybody? God’s God’s great love look as a child of God his agape love for you is a perfect love and it’s perfect right now see he will never love you any more or any less than he does right now because as his child he loves you fully and he loves you perfectly right now your your actions as a Christian don’t affect God’s love for you did you hear that Your actions as a Christian don’t affect God’s love for you. Your actions can glorify Him and honor Him and be well-pleasing to Him, yes. They can also grieve Him and sadden Him, but they won’t affect His agape love that He has for you, no. See, nothing we do or did has an influence on His love. Rather, the love of God is free, spontaneous, and uncaused. The only reason why God loves any of us is found in His own sovereign will. God didn’t love us because we loved Him, but He loved us before we had a particle of love for Him. See, biblically, God loved His people before heaven and earth were called into existence, before the foundation of the world. And look, since God’s love toward me had no beginning, it can therefore have no ending. See, His love is sovereign. His love is infinite. His love is without limit. His love for us is beyond measure. It doesn’t change. It’s gracious and giving. And get this, nothing can separate us from the love of God forever. as his children, Romans 8.39. Nothing. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. Try to think of the love that God has for us. Try to think of the love that God has for you. The infinite loving the finite. The creator loving the creature. The most high God loving a worm, as one said. The most holy one loving the unholy. The sovereign one loving his rebellious subject. And it’s real. And it’s intense. Think about it. God loved his people first. We love him because he first loved us. As he says, I have loved you with an everlasting love. See, God’s love was fixed upon us and it flowed out to us, His people, freely. Why? He alone knows. But it’s beyond expression and it’s beyond conception. Look, His love doesn’t depend on what we are. It flows from His own heart. It isn’t a love of something good in us. It’s because of everything good in Him. See? One said, how wonderful that God should love one like me and love me with such a love. That’s right. He loved us before time began. We’re experiencing that love in intense measure right now. And look, that love will be seen and felt for all eternity in abounding measure. Once fixed, it’s fixed forever. So how much does He love you? Well, He gave His Son for you. How about that? He poured out His divine wrath against your sin onto the Son so you could be with Him. Talk about love. How could love like that not win us over? How could love like that not flow out of us back to Him in tangible and passionate ways? Oh, that we could understand God’s love more fully today because if we could understand it a bit more fully, then we wouldn’t be as prone as we are to run into sin and to run into rebellion. He loves us this much and we can’t forgive? He loves us this much and we can’t battle sin more than we do? He loves us this much and we are spiritually lethargic and compromising? Really? We’ve lost sight of His great love for us. Oh, that we would be reminded of it again today. One said, if I realize that God loves me, loves me infinitely, loves me eternally, then I can do anything for God. And I can suffer anything from the hand of Why? Because we know that a God who loves us this much can be trusted. Right? Even when things are hard. A God who loves us this much can be trusted. This love gives us perspective. This love raises us above our trials. This love comforts us in our lonely hours and in our seasons of sickness and of sorrow. And this love inspires us to be courageous and to be bold and to be godly because a God like this is worthy of our passionate love in return, is he not? Yes, He is. So, how do we see this love? We see it in what Paul says next. Look, God has made us alive in Christ. Even when we were dead in trespasses, He made us alive together with Christ. And in that, we see the unfathomable love of God for us. Remember. Again, we were all born dead spiritually because Adam’s sin nature has been handed down to all of us. That means that while people are alive physically, they are born without the ability to seek God, to pursue God, to love God, to be saved apart from God’s amazing grace because they’re spiritually dead to God. Corpses, spiritually speaking. But look, just as God breathed into lifeless dust to give life to Adam, the Lord gives spiritual life to his chosen ones, to those who were once spiritually dead. This is something that God alone can do. We don’t have the ability to bring life from death. A dead person can’t will himself to breathe. A truly lifeless person can’t awaken himself up from the dead. And neither can we give life to a spiritually dead person, but God can do it. And He’s good at it. Anybody? These verses are very clear in what they are saying to us. Yet many Christians don’t really believe what they are saying to us. Many Christians today view salvation as a joint project between God and men. God has done all that He can do. The rest is up to the sinner. They don’t view him as dead, but rather as sick or wounded. Like a drowning man, there’s still life in him. He can grab the rope if we throw the rope to him. But if he refuses to cooperate, well, then even God can’t save that person. But that’s an unbiblical view of salvation. It sounds really good. It’s an unbiblical view of salvation. The biblical view is summed up in this, God made us alive. Or this, Jesus saves Jesus alone. As the angel announced to Joseph concerning Jesus in Matthew 1.21, he will save his people from their sins. He didn’t say he will do all he can, but he’s limited by the sinner’s stubborn will. He didn’t say he will throw a rope to everyone, but they’ve got to grab it to be saved. That’s not what he said. See, God isn’t frustrated in heaven, wishing that he could do more. Man, I’d like to save Saul of Tarsus, but man, that guy is so stubborn. What happened to Saul? God went after Saul. God opened Saul’s spiritual eyes. God knocked Saul down and made him blind physically, but he gave him spiritual sight. God did it. And the hope of the gospel is that God saves sinners. We were dead, but God, right? He has made us alive. Who? Who? god steve cole noted this we need to understand that salvation is not a matter of a spiritually sick sinner deciding to take medicine if it were we could perhaps talk him into making that decision it’s not a matter of a drowning man grabbing the life ring who wouldn’t grab it if he knew his desperate condition rather the sinner is a corpse this is what ephesians has told us right very clearly the sinner is a corpse floating face down in the water he’s dead God must raise him up from the dead. That’s right. But the good news is that God can raise the dead. He can impart new life to dead sinners. God made us alive even when we were dead in our sins. And all the glory goes to him. This is called the doctrine of regeneration, which is summarized in this way. regeneration or the new birth is a work of God’s grace where believers become new creatures in Christ. It’s a change of heart wrought by the Holy Spirit through conviction of sin to which the sinner responds in repentance towards God and faith in the Lord. This was talked about in the Old Testament. Two particular Old Testament prophets, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, were led by the Holy Spirit to communicate this doctrine. In Ezekiel 36, 26 through 27, God says, Who? God. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. So who’s going to do it? God and it seems clear that the stony-hearted sinner will do nothing until God gives him a heart of flesh this doctrine is reiterated in the New Testament John says that the people received Jesus because they were first born of God see a person isn’t born again by virtue of a human decision But the believing ones were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. When Jesus was talking to Nicodemus, he said that the new birth is mysterious, much like the movement of the wind, and it’s a supernatural work. James, Peter, and Paul also make clear that the new birth, the regeneration, is a supernatural work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the dead sinner that produces a change of heart that’s the equivalent of being brought from the spiritually dead, to being spiritually alive. Repentance and faith are the evidences of the spiritual life that’s been planted in the soul of the person. And look, all that God regenerates come to Him in saving faith. So God awakens them, He enlivens them, He regenerates them, and all that God awakens see Him, and they come to Him in repentant faith. God does this. Picture it like this. There’s a corpse who’s clearly dead. The corpse then comes to life. He opens his eyes. We know who did that. And he sees the God who gave him life when he was dead. And now the newly enlivened corpse stays his gaze on the Lord who made him alive. And he loves the Lord who made him alive. And he surrenders all to the Lord who made him alive. And he follows after the Lord who made him alive when he was dead. And loving heartfelt obedience to the Lord who made him alive. And that’s what we see going on here in Ephesians 2. You were dead. but he made you alive. Pretty cut and dried. It’s an old saying that goes like this. Born once, die twice. Born twice, die once. That’s right. Who does this? Who makes us alive in Christ? God does.
SPEAKER 02 :
Thanks for joining us for today’s exposition from the book of Ephesians on expository truths with Dr. John Kyle. Continue on with us next week at this same time. And to find this sermon in its entirety as well as other sermons, visit vacavillefaith.org. Faith Community Church seeks to exalt Christ by bringing clarity of truth through the scriptures with a commitment to glorifying God through the pure, deep, and reaching message of the gospel through faithful exposition. Pastor John is the preaching pastor at Faith Community Church of Vacaville, a seminary professor and a trainer of preaching pastors overseas. Join Faith Community Church for worship Sundays at 9 and 1045 a.m. Located at 192 Bella Vista Road, Suite A in Vacaville. To learn more, visit vacavillefaith.org or call 707-451-2026. That’s vacavillefaith.org.
