Ephesians 1:3 says that we have been blessed with all spiritual blessings in Christ. But what are these spiritual blessings, and what do they do for us? Contrary to some beliefs, they are not some mysterious power or cosmic connection reserved for a select few.
Ephesians 1:3: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places."
Notice that we have in this one verse, blessed, blessed, and blessings, all variations of the same Greek word. Paul expresses a desire for blessings to the Father who has blessed us with all spiritual blessings. I love that expression - “heavenly felicity!” Felicity is just great happiness or blissfulness. Thus, when Paul talks about how God has blessed us, he means God has brought us happiness, more than happiness really - He brought us joy.
He brought joy into our lives through His Son and His gift of eternal life and our identification with His Son, and in all of that, God has given us all these spiritual favors, advantages, privileges. He has spiritually enriched our lives and made us spiritually prosperous. He has also made us prosperous in that He made us co-inheritors with His Son.
With Christ, we are inheriting the entire universe. We will literally possess everything. We couldn’t be more prosperous in the physical sense than to be co-inheritors with Christ. Literally, the entire universe is yours. I’d say we’ve received blessings from God in the sense of the second definition. God has brought us joy. He has given us a gift of eternal life. He has given us all these spiritual benefits, if you will.
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By blessed, Paul is saying our lives have been greatly enriched. When you got saved, you believed that Christ died on the cross as a payment for all your sins, that He was buried and rose again the third day. His death was the payment. His resurrection was the receipt. You believed that and you got saved. God gave you His free gift of eternal life.
Thus, you are now no longer who you were because His death became your death. His resurrection became your resurrection. You are now a completely new creature - behold all things new! Everything you were in Adam is D.E.A.D. You’re now freed from the power and bondage of sin. And you are made alive unto God, complete in Him. You are His master workmanship.
You’ve been given so many spiritual advantages and blessings from God, it’s like walking inside a warehouse so vast and so endless, you couldn’t possibly inventory all the blessings God has given you. Paul makes the point in Rom 8:32 that if God spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?
If God loved you so much that He was generous enough to give up His only Son to die for you, then wouldn’t God also be generous enough to freely give you everything? God has literally given you everything. He loves you as much as His Son. He has given you as much as His Son.
So what are some of these spiritual blessings God’s freely given to us? Eph. 1:3-14 is a doxology and Paul would expand upon this very thought throughout his doxology. In vs. 4-5, Paul talks about predestination. That is about how, before the universe was created, God made all His decisions about this age of grace. God making those decisions about our lives before He created the universe were spiritual blessings.
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Notice also, Paul doesn’t say SOME spiritual blessings but ALL spiritual blessings IN heavenly places IN Christ. By all, he means every single spiritual blessing. Here’s a question: “How can Paul say we’ve been given ALL spiritual blessings if we don’t have miraculous spiritual gifts?” God isn’t doing miraculous healings IN heavenly places.
At the end of the day, His great miracles, the miraculous feeding of thousands of people, Him raising people from the dead, all His epic miracles, did very little to move the needle of faith in the people of Israel. Spiritual gifts were never true blessings. They were double-edged swords and distractions at best. There’s no downside to what God made you in Christ.
There’s no downside to having His Word and having His peace and joy and love and grace manifest inside of you. Those are true blessings. Thus, spiritual blessings means that God has brought joy into our lives. He’s enriched our lives, He has given us advantages and privileges that are spiritual in nature. The enrichment from God is spiritual in nature. Another way of saying it is that a “spiritual blessing” is a blessing of the Spirit. These are internal advantages and privileges through the Holy Spirit.
I’ve heard it said that wealth is power and wealth can help a person make changes to his life. How much more true is it with all the spiritual wealth we have in Christ? Ephesians 1:3-14 is an excellent text to give us confidence and comfort in times of trouble. It reminds us of everything God has blessed us with in Christ. Embracing this truth gives us solid ground to stand on in the midst of trials.
He’s issuing a call to praise God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Why? He says that God has blessed (eulogeó - “confer what is beneficial”) us in Christ. And what is it that He’s given us? By “us”, Paul means true believers in Jesus Christ. And what has God blessed believers with? The Greek word for “spiritual” (pneumatikos) speaks to the source of these blessings. This word is most often used in Scripture in reference to the Holy Spirit.
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Therefore, the Holy Spirit is the source of these blessings. And Paul says that we have been blessed with every spiritual blessing. Notice that he doesn’t say we’ve been blessed with some spiritual blessings. He doesn’t even say that we’ve been blessed with many spiritual blessings. What does that mean? It means God has given us everything we need in this life.
We have all spiritual resources at our disposal at all times. If you have placed your faith in Christ, God has given you everything you need to live a life that honors him. Embracing the truth that God has already given you everything you need in Christ can completely change your mindset. This truth should keep me from failing to utilize what I already have at my disposal in Christ.
The word blessing in Ephesians 1:3 is a translation of the Greek word eulogy, and it means “to speak well of.” Since God is the one acting in this verse, we can say that God has spoken good things about us, or pronounced good things for our benefit. The first blessing listed is the election as saints. Ephesians 1:4 says that He has “chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love.”
God has chosen to make us holy and blameless, and all because of His love, His good pleasure, and His grace (verses 5-6). What a blessing, that “even when we were dead in sins” (Ephesians 2:5), God chose to extend His grace to us and offer us salvation. The second blessing listed is found in verse 5-our adoption as His children. Not only has God chosen us to be made holy, but He grants us full status as His children, with all the benefits thereof.
The third spiritual blessing is in verse 6, where we are made “accepted in the beloved.” The word is related to grace and gives the idea of making us graceful or favorable through Christ, the beloved of God. When we put on Christ, the Father sees His loveliness when He looks at us. This leads us right into the fourth blessing (Ephesians 1:7), the redemption through His blood. Redemption speaks of buying one’s freedom, paying a ransom.
The price for our sins, the payment to buy us out of eternal condemnation, was fully paid by the blood of Christ. In Christ, we are no longer slaves to sin, but we become slaves to God. Verse 7 also describes the fifth blessing, the forgiveness of sins. It is closely related to redemption, but looks at the other side of the coin. In paying the ransom for our sins, the debt of sin was canceled, and we were forgiven.
The sixth spiritual blessing listed is knowing the mystery of His will (Ephesians 1:8-10). God has given us wisdom and insight through His Word and has shown us His desire to bring all things together to glorify Christ. Since all of creation was made by Him and is for His good pleasure (Revelation 4:11), the consummation of His plan is when everything and everyone is brought in line to glorify Him.
Verse 11 says that another blessing is the inheritance that is given to us through Christ. What is included in that inheritance? “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). Another blessing is found in Ephesians 1:13, which is the sealing of the Holy Spirit. When we become God’s children, He places His mark of ownership on us, guaranteeing our eternal security.
The list could go on and on speaking of the privileges that are ours in Christ. We are laborers together with God (1 Corinthians 3:9); we are ambassadors bringing the message of reconciliation to a foreign land (2 Corinthians 5:20); and we are the bride of Christ (2 Corinthians 11:2). How do we access all of these blessings? They are readily accessible to everyone who is in Christ Jesus.
The way to be in Christ is to repent, or turn away from our sins (Acts 17:30), confessing to God that we are sinners (Proverbs 28:13; Romans 10:9).
Understanding God's Plan: Holiness, Adoption, and Grace
Introduction God’s purpose for every believer is reconciliation in Christ for all time. Therefore, if you’re in Christ, your life is absolutely massive, with a glorious destiny. I wonder if you believe that? This world minimizes us, selling a cheap version of everything. We’re surrounded by the trivial and phony and misleading, rushing us from one distraction to another. We grow tired and disappointed. After a while, we begin to wonder what life amounts to. We trust Jesus and do our best, but we still fail. Sometimes we feel weak and worthless. But the Christian should abound in hope. How can we do that?
We need to see the glorious things God has done for us, and the ultimate end to which he’s taking us. In these verses, Paul helps us see that. Now, I know many people find the doctrines of God’s election and predestination very difficult. Many godly Christians have differing views. But we are not saved by our perfect understanding of these doctrines. We aren’t saved by a doctrine at all. We’re saved by a person, Jesus Christ.
You may have questions about these doctrines, and we won’t answer all those today. After all, this passage is not a treatise on election and predestination. It is about the end to which they lead: that we should be holy and blameless before God, and our adoption through Christ, to the praise his glorious grace.
God, the Father, chose us, his people, in him, Jesus Christ. In verse 3, Paul says God blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, and the first blessing he highlights is that of election. So what is election? Election is God’s sovereign choice of his people unto salvation. Paul isn’t introducing a new doctrine. It’s one that runs throughout the whole of Scripture. Paul also doesn’t make an argument for election here, he merely affirms it to drive us to its purpose.
What is our election for? “That we should be holy and blameless before him.” To be holy and blameless means, in the simplest terms, to be like God. The Bible is very clear that God is holy. His holiness is not a part of who he is; it is who he is. Holiness means wholeness, completeness, perfection in every moral sense. To be holy is to possess ultimate purity. It is also to lack all pollution. So God is blameless, spotless, with no impurity, no stain, no reason for shame. And Paul says our election is so that we might be like that.
Remember God’s words to Moses, “You cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” That’s because man is unholy. The author of Hebrews says without holiness no one will see the Lord. So, holiness is not merely a nice addition to our lives. It’s a requirement for our future life in God’s presence. So, what’s the hope for us? Is it that one day we’ll figure it out on our own? One day we’ll find the right rule book or attend the right class or find enough willpower?
If salvation is left in our hands, we will certainly fail. Just think back to that New Year’s resolution you made this year. We have trouble keeping promises to ourselves. How much more do we have trouble keeping promises to God? But what sets Christianity apart as a religion is that our salvation is not dependent upon what we do or choose. It’s dependent upon what God does and who God chooses. A Christian is holy because God chose them. They are not chosen because they are holy.
When you realize how unholy you really and how holy God really is, you are floored that he would love you. When you realize that despite all the times you’ve rejected him, refused him, rebelled against him, run from him, he still saved you, you fall in worship before him. You realize how deserving of wrath you are, and you see how wonderful the grace and mercy of God is. When you really grasp this, there is no doctrine as comforting.
When you really see that the only reason you’re a Christian is that God in mercy and grace chose you before the foundation of the world, you begin to realize you’re not on shaky ground with God. You don’t have to wonder if he’s going to love you tomorrow. He’s loved you before the foundation of the world! If he chose you back then and done all he’s done to save you in Christ, is he going to give you up now when you’re so close to being with him for eternity?
God is changing us to be holy and blameless before him because God never planned to accept us just as we are. That’s not good enough for him and it’s not good enough for us. To be before him, we must be changed. But he’s not asking us to change ourselves. He took the initiative. He did the work on our behalf, without our permission, to bring us to himself through the cleansing blood of Jesus who lived, died, and rose again. His perfect blood washes us holy, and his perfect righteousness makes us blameless.
Paul wants us to understand how deeply God loves and saves us, so he uses another image: God adopts us through Christ. God adopts us through Christ In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will There is some debate about where the little phrase “in love” belongs. The Greek text is totally ambiguous. Many translations, including the ESV, begin verse 5 with it. It could modify the end of verse 4. We just can’t be sure. But it fits either place, because God’s love effects our holiness and blamelessness and our predestination for adoption.
Election tells us that God chooses whom he will. Predestination says whom God chooses, he adopts. In other words, God doesn’t choose and set aside. God chooses and brings in. One great theme of Ephesians is God’s reconciliation of all things in Christ. How does that happen? Well, it starts with God’s adoption of sons and daughters, tongues and tribes, into his family.
Notice what Paul says. According to the purpose of his will. God adopts us because he wants to. There is no other reason: not your goodness, not your potential, only the purpose of God’s will. When you meet someone truly alive to God, one thing you can’t help but notice is they can’t get over the fact that God wants them. They accept it wholeheartedly, but they’re amazed. One way you can know how alive you are to God is what you think about being his child.
Paul’s concept of adoption comes from his Roman culture. The father had ultimate authority over the family. He could even kill a family member without it being considered murder. Often, an important father would have only daughters and no one to carry on the family line, to inherit his property, and so forth. So, he would adopt a son. He would seek a child he wanted and adopt him from his natural home into his home. The adoptee received all the blessings and inheritance of his new family. He has a new status, a new name, new privileges.
This was a common practice, for example, with Emperors. Augustus was adopted into the royal family. He was from a poor family and became the Emperor of Rome through adoption. So, when Paul says that God has predestined us to adoption through Jesus Christ, he’s saying that though we are like Augustus, once from a destitute and poor family, we’re now placed into the royal family. We were sons of disobedience and children of wrath because we are sinners, but God in Christ has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.
We are God’s children now, and no one else has any claim on us. No one else has any power over us. Satan has no rule, no claim, no right to influence our lives one bit. We are God’s children, and we will always be so! No one can snatch us from his family. What was the cost? The cost was the Son of God, Jesus Christ, our big brother. The whole Trinity is involved in our salvation, their plan before the foundation of the world was to adopt us at the cost of the Son into the family of God.
You are not another child butting into Jesus’ happy only-child existence. You’re the little brother or sister Jesus always wanted. He wanted you so much he didn’t merely bring you in, he joined you to himself. He made you co-heir with him. Your life may not feel all that glorious, but if you’re a Christian, the glorious God has done this glorious work for you. He chose you and predestined you to be his child.
Our adoption means we’re back in the family, guys. We’re home, and it feels so good. Adoption means you could not be more loved. And our response to this saving love is praise. Look at verse 6. God blesses us to praise his glorious grace to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. Throughout chapter 1, there is a goal. Three times, in verses 6, 12, and 14, is a call to praise God for his grace. I wonder what you think of that. I wonder if it sounds a strange goal to you?
“The most obvious fact about praise - whether of God or anything - strangely escaped me. I thought of it in terms of compliment, approval, or the giving of honor. I had never noticed that all enjoyment spontaneously overflows into praise . . . The world rings with praise - lovers praising their mistresses, readers their favorite poet, walkers praising the countryside, players praising their favorite game - praise of weather, wines, dishes, actors, motors, horses, colleges, countries, historical personages, children, flowers, mountains, rare stamps, rare beetles, even sometimes politicians or scholars. . . . praise almost seems to be inner health made audible. . . . I had not noticed that just as men spontaneously praise whatever they value, so they spontaneously urge us to join them in praising it: 'Isn't she lovely? Wasn't it glorious? Don't you think that magnificent?' The Psalmists in telling everyone to praise God are doing what all men do when they speak of what they care about. My whole, more general, difficulty about the praise of God depended on my absurdly denying to us what we delight to do, what indeed we can't help doing, about everything else we value.”
Christians are on the path toward inner health made audible, to complete fulfillment and enjoyment of the one person whom our heart longs for the most. We are racing toward the presence of God, and one day we will get there. And our response will be praise. I wonder if this sounds as good to us as it should. I think to really get it, we need to back up and consider two words in verse 4 that we kind of raced over before. God chose us that we should be holy and blameless before him. If we want to understand why the goal is the praise of God, we must understand the weight of it means to be before him.
God is and will forever be the most glorious person. Our enjoyment of him will be complete as we praise him. Our deepest desires will find their fullest satisfaction. Just as you had to contain your heart from exploding on your wedding day, standing before God in holiness and blamelessness will be a complete inability to keep your mouth shut.
All your greatest desires will pour out in praise, your greatest joys will find their end, your deepest longings will be totally satisfied before him. You will have no further wants, no further needs. You will be whole in a way you can barely imagine right now. You will wonder how your heart can take it all in, but it can, because God will give you an even greater heart to bear it-a heart holy and blameless.
In this world, we constantly encounter cheap imitations of the real thing. But one day, we will be brought to ultimate reality himself.
Table of Spiritual Blessings in Ephesians 1:3-14
| Blessing | Description | Verse |
|---|---|---|
| Election as Saints | Chosen to be holy and blameless | Ephesians 1:4 |
| Adoption as Children | Granted full status as God's children | Ephesians 1:5 |
| Acceptance in the Beloved | Made graceful and favorable through Christ | Ephesians 1:6 |
| Redemption Through His Blood | Freedom bought by the blood of Christ | Ephesians 1:7 |
| Forgiveness of Sins | Debt of sin canceled | Ephesians 1:7 |
| Knowing the Mystery of His Will | Wisdom and insight into God's plan | Ephesians 1:8-10 |
| Inheritance Through Christ | Promise of unseen and unheard things | Ephesians 1:11 |
| Sealing of the Holy Spirit | Mark of ownership and eternal security | Ephesians 1:13 |
The Sovereignty of God in Salvation (Ephesians 1:3–14) John MacArthur
