I. “AND YOU WERE DEAD…” – our hopeless predicament apart from Christ (2:1-3).
In the sphere which matters most, “they have no life… They are blind to the glory of Jesus Christ, and deaf to the voice of the Holy Spirit. They have no love for God, no sensitive awareness to his personal reality, no leaping of their spirit towards him in the cry, ‘Abba, Father’, no longing for fellowship with his people. They are as unresponsive to him as a corpse.”—Stott, The Message of Ephesians, p.72
• We lived according to the values of the world around us.
• We lived according to the wishes of the devil.
• We lived according to the passions of our flesh.
• We were objects of the righteous wrath of God.
God’s wrath “is neither spite, nor malice, nor animosity, nor revenge. It is never arbitrary, since it is the divine reaction to only one situation, namely evil. Therefore, it is entirely predictable, and it is never subject to mood, whim, or caprice… It is God’s personal, righteous, constant hostility to evil, his settled refusal to compromise with it, and his resolve instead to condemn it. Further, his wrath is not incompatible with his love…
We need, I think, to be more grateful to God for his wrath, and to worship him that because his righteousness is perfect he always reacts to evil in the same unchanging, predictable, uncompromising way. Without his moral constancy we could enjoy no peace.”—Stott, p.76
II. “BUT GOD MADE YOU ALIVE!” – the supernatural nature of our new birth (2:4-6).
A. Why, when, what & how . . . did God make us alive?
B. What does it mean to be “born again”?
“I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.”—Ezekiel 36:25-27
Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”—John 3:3-8
C. Why is this important?
