The Second Chapter Verses 1-10
The Masterpiece
Produced.
After the great revelation of the first chapter and the
prayer which followed, the production of the Masterpiece itself is now brought
more fully into view. We have before us a revelation concerning our state by
nature and how God takes us up and produces out of such material His
Masterpiece. The first ten verses of this chapter give us this story. These
verses belong to the richest of the whole Word of God.
1. What Man
is by Nature. Verses 1-3.
"And you, who were dead in trespasses and
sins, wherein in times past ye walked according to the course of this world,
according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in
the children of disobedience; among whom also we all had our conversation in
times past in the lusts of our flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the
children of wrath, even as others."
What Man, Jew or Gentile, is by
nature, is first brought forward. The contrast between the Epistle to the
Romans and that to the Ephesians is interesting. In Romans the Spirit of God
demonstrates at length the guilt and unrighteousness of the whole world.
Gentiles without the law and the Jews with the law are seen equally guilty and
lost. All have sinned. Jews and Gentiles are all under sin. The divine verdict
is "there is none righteous, no, not one." (Rom. iii:9-10). God stops every
mouth and shows that the whole world is guilty and lost (iii:19). Upon that
dark background God writes the story of His love in His blessed Son, and
reveals His righteousness, which is by faith of Jesus Christ, unto all and upon
all that believe. He reaches down into the terrible pit where man is as sinner
and discovers the way out, leading forth in the Epistle to the Romans, till the
summit is reached in the eighth chapter. In Ephesians nothing is said of Man's
condition in the opening chapter. God speaks of Himself and His sovereign Grace
first of all and leads us far higher than in the Epistle to the Romans. And
after He has made known His plans and His work, after He has revealed the
riches of His Grace and into what He brings those who believe on His Son, He
tells us what material we are. Our desperate condition in which we are by
nature is uncovered.
A. Dead in Trespasses and
Sins.
nature in the state of death. This is spiritual death.
While in Romans the conduct of Man as a sinner is made prominent, here it is
the condition in which man is. Man is dead spiritually, dead towards God,
because man is conceived and born in sin. The entire Word of God bears witness
to this condition. The spiritual death of man is the foundation fact of the
Gospel. If man were not in that condition, he would not be in need of
salvation. Our Lord emphasized this condition. He told the religious Pharisee
Nicodemus, the moral and learned ruler of the Jews, one of the finest types of
the natural man, that he had no life and "must be born again." In His great
discourse in the fifth chapter of the Gospel of John, our Lord makes the
declaration that man is spiritually dead. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, he
that heareth my Word, and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting life,
and shall not come into judgment; but is passed from death unto life" (John
v:24). This shows clearly that as long as man does not believe on the Son of
God, he is in the state of death, and only Grace by faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ can change that condition.
Again He said, "Verily, verily I say unto
you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the
Son of God, and they that hear shall live" (John v:25). The dead in this verse
are not the physically dead, for He speaks of those in verses 28-29 of the same
chapter. He describes the condition of man spiritually and shows that He alone
can change this condition. And His power to raise the physically dead was
abundantly demonstrated when He raised Lazarus from the dead, after he had lain
four days in the grave. Lazarus dead, in the darkness, and corruption of the
grave, may well be used as a picture of man as he is in his natural state. The
scholar, the learned, the moral man, the philanthropist, all, no matter what
they are or have made of themselves, if unregenerated, are dead towards God;
they are in the darkness and corruption of spiritual death. This is a hard
saying for the twentieth century. We hear much of the "better self" or "the
good spark" which is in everybody. Appeals are made to live better and cleaner
lives, but the truth God has revealed concerning man, that he is dead in
trespasses and sins, is but little believed.
B. Enemies of God under the Prince of the Power of the
Air.
The next verse tells us of the walk in which the natural
man is found. It is according to the course of this world, according to the
Prince of the Power of the Air, the spirit which now worketh in the children of
disobedience. It fully reveals the awful place in which man is as dead in
trespasses and sins. The walk is according to the nature; the lust of the
flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life are the governing principles
of this walk. All are enemies of God by wicked works. And behind all there
stands the Prince of the Power of the Air, Satan. He works in the children of
disobedience, which here means the Jews. Of this our Lord spake when He said,
"Ye are of your father, the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do"
(John viii :44). And again it is written, "He that committeth sin is of the
devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning" (1 John iii :8). It is a
solemn truth, which God has revealed concerning our condition as fallen beings,
that we are in the grasp of the Prince of the Power of the Air; that man is
under this mighty Being of Darkness. To what a place of degradation man has
been brought by sin! This likewise is disbelieved by the great majority of
professing Christians. A personal devil is ridiculed and his existence denied.
But all these denials cannot change the true condition as made known by the
Spirit of God. These denials emanate from this very Being, whose work is to
blind the eyes of man so that he cannot see his real condition before God. As
long as the natural man has not received that life, which God offers in His
Son, he is dead in trespasses and in sins, and is forced to walk according to
the course of this age, held in captivity by sin and Satan, whose slave he
is.
C. Children of Wrath.
The
"you" of the first verse is addressed to the Ephesians, who were of the
Gentiles, and their unsaved condition is thus pictured. When in this verse it
is stated "among whom also we had our conversation," the Apostle shows that the
Jews were in the same condition. And he adds, "and were by nature the children
of wrath, even as others." The Spirit of God shows that Gentiles and Jews by
nature are the children of wrath. The wrath of a holy and righteous God rests
upon man in this awful condition. "He that believeth on the Son hath
everlasting life; and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the
wrath of God abideth on him" (John iii :36). No Millennial Dawnist,
Restitutionist, or as some call themselves, "Reconciliationist," nor any of the
other errorists of the present day, can disprove this simple and solemn
statement. They attempt an explanation, but fail in it. The truth revealed that
we are "children of wrath" by nature and remain children of wrath as long as we
are outside of Christ, is increasingly denied. What a significant fact, that
God has revealed to us our true condition in which we are by nature! And man
denies this revelation and refuses to believe what God saith about him. This
denial is found in all the cults of Anti-christianity, such as the new
Theology, Christian Science, the new religion, Russellism or Millennial
Dawnism, Bahaism, Theosophy and a number of others.
But where is there
a true child of God, saved by Grace, enjoying the knowledge of the Gospel with
its blessed depths and marvellous heights, who denies the truth of the first
three verses of the second chapter of Ephesians? We know it is our true
photograph. We acknowledge it all to be true. Such material God has to produce
out of it His great Masterpiece.
2. What God
does, rich in Mercy. Verses 4-6.
After this dark picture of
death, ruin and wrath, we read of what God has done and does for all those who
are in that condition, who believe on His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. We shall
find how, in the riches of His Mercy, He reaches, in His Son, down to these
conditions of death and despair and gives life in place of death, raises up
with Christ out of the condi-tions of enmity and Satan's power, and changes all
who believe, from children of wrath, into children of Glory. It is a
marvellous, a most blessed revelation given in a few sentences.
A. The foundation. The great love wherewith
He loved us.
"But God who is rich in mercy, for the great great love,
wherewith He loved us" (Verse 4). This is the precious bridge, which leads out
of the dark and dreary, hopeless condition. How beautiful are the first two
words of this verse! How sweet they are to faith. But God:
There are many
"But God" in the Bible, and it is well for the reader of the Word of God to
notice them. When human power is ended, when man's help fails, when all is
dark, when hope is gone, then "But God"! May our faith constantly lay hold upon
it, and whenever difficulties arise, trials and troubles surround us and
insurmountable obstacles, mountains, confront us, may we cry triumphantly, "But
God!" And so here in our passage. Man is helpless; Man in himself is hopeless.
What can one do who is dead? What can a person do who is the slave of a
powerful being, whose chains cannot be snapt by a puny effort? What can one
expect who has deserved only wrath? But God! God now comes to the front and
makes known that towards such as we are, He is rich in mercy. Rich in Mercy!
How often one hears this. Who does not talk of the mercy of God? Hindus,
Mohamedans, Unitarians, Bahaists, all talk of God being merciful. But God who
is righteous cannot be rich in mercy unless His righteousness is satisfied and
His mercy rests completely upon that righteousness. And this is blessedly the
case. He has loved us with a great love. For that great love with which He has
loved us, He is now towards such as we are, "rich in Mercy" and can take us up
and out of our condition. John iii :16 tells us of that great love. He gave His
only begotten Son. He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us. He put the cup
of wrath to His blessed lips and He drank the last drop of it, which was our
due. The Lord Jesus Christ met all the claims of God's right-eousness, and now
God is rich in Mercy, for the great love wherewith He loved us.
On
account of this great Love wherewith God has loved us, which enables Him, who
is righteous, to be rich in mercy, God can take up lost sinners and lift them
so high. How God does it is now revealed in a few words.
B.
Quickened us together with Christ.
"Even when we were dead in
sins hath quickened us together with Christ" (by Grace ye are saved). Verse
5.
The verse and that which follows in which we read of the believer's
resurrection with Christ and being seated in Christ in the heavenlies, takes us
back to the time when our blessed Saviour Lord was quickened and raised from
the dead and seated in Glory. It is plain what God did for Him, who died on the
Cross, He has done for all, who believe on His Son. Many Christians are
ignorant of this great truth, while others have difficulty in grasping it. Yet
it is quite simple. Every Christian believes that when the Lord Jesus suffered
on the Cross He bore their sins in His own body on the tree. With the Apostle
Paul every believer is entitled to say in looking back to the Cross, "He loved
Me, He gave Himself for me." We know all our sins were paid for by His work;
all the punishment we deserved fell upon Him, our gracious substitute. In Him
we died. All this happened when we were not in existence at all. The sins He
bore were not yet committed. God knew all about us and all about our sins and
shame, the punish-ment we deserved, and His ever-blessed Son took all upon
Himself. In the same sense God hath quickened us with Christ, raised us up and
seated us in Him, when He did this for His Son our Lord Jesus Christ. This is
simple, yet so wonderful and deep, that it is incomprehensible. It was all done
for us, who believe, when it was done for Him. God in His marvellous counsels
in redemption has associated us with Christ. He has made all, who believe on
Him, sharers of His life and nature; He brings them into the same rela-tionship
as sons, and finally into the same Glory and Inheritance. Let us bear in mind
that all this was done for us in Christ. He is the first One who was quickened,
raised up and exalted in Glory, and associated with Him are all His members; we
share it with Him.
But from this high point of God's counsels we must
descend and speak now of our individual quickening and how all this becomes our
blessed and real portion by faith in Jesus Christ. Before we do this, we call
attention to the word "together." It is generally misapplied. Many read as if
it meant we are "quickened together with Christ." If this were the meaning, the
word "together" would be superfluous; it would be sufficient to say "quickened
with Christ." The word "together" has reference to "Jews and Gentiles"; these
two, as seen elsewhere in this chapter, are made one and both are quickened
with Christ. The word "quicken" is an old English word and means "imparting
life." We learned from the first verse of this chapter that man is dead in
trespasses and sins. Our condition is that of spiritual death. But God in His
great masterpiece of redemption has life for us, which He imparts as His gift.
That life is spiritual and eternal; it is the Life of His Son, who died and was
raised from the dead. "Verily, verily I say unto you, except a corn of wheat
fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it dies it bringeth
forth much fruit" (John xii :24). He went into death and the grave, but came
forth out of the grave. It is this life of the Son of God the sinner receives,
when He believes on Him. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My
Word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life and shall not
come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life. Verily, verily I say
unto you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of
the Son of God; and they that hear shall live" (John v:24, 25). As soon, then,
as a sinner believes on the Son of God, casts himself as a lost sinner upon
Christ, he receives life, eternal life, as the gift of God.
How little
this great, yet simple fundamental Gospel truth is known and enjoyed among the
great mass of professing Christians. Some years ago a Y. M. C. A. Secretary
showed us a large number of cards, which had been signed during an evangelistic
campaign. The cards were in the form of a pledge. "From now on I promise to
lead a better religious and Christian life." We asked the Secretary how it is
possible for a person to lead a better life, when that person has no life at
all. Before there can be a better life, a life lived to please God, there must
be the communication of spiritual life, of which man by nature is destitute.
"They that are in the flesh cannot please God," because they that are in the
flesh are simply natural men, without the new nature. The Gospel does not come
to man demanding to do better, to stop lying or stealing, to lead a better
life. The Gospel does not say, Do and act right and you shall have life. The
Gospel offers life to man dead in trespasses and sins. When that life, the gift
of God, is received by faith in Jesus Christ, the doing follows. Only as we
receive this life can we live and walk in righteousness.
There is a
beautiful parable concerning Jerusalem in the Book of Ezekiel, which fully
illustrates this (Ez. xvi:1-14), "Thy birth and thy nativity is of the land of
Canaan; thy father was an Amorite, and thy mother a Hittite" (Ez. xvi:3). What
a parentage! It fully illustrates Psalm li:5, "Behold, I was shapen in
iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me." And when that child was born,
it was cast out. "Thou wast cast out into the open field to the loathing of thy
person, in the day that thou wast born." It pictures our condition by nature.
Sin has put us into the "open field" (the world), and put us into the desperate
condition in which this little one is seen. And what could this child do,
laying in its own blood in the open field? Could it help itself, wash itself,
save itself and lead a better life? Absolutely impossible! It needed salvation,
and it found salvation, not by its efforts, but from the Lord who passed by.
"And when I passed by thee, and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said
unto thee, when thou wast in thy blood, live!" In mercy He beheld the
miserable, lost little one and the first thing He did was to speak the word of
Life and by it communicated life to the one doomed in death. All this shows
forth the Gospel concerning life. It is the first thing our Lord does, when He
finds us, giving us life. In the same parable we read what else He did for the
child. He entered into covenant with the child, "and thou becamest mine." "I
washed thee with water" . . . "I anointed thee with oil." He clothed the child,
provided shoes, covered it with silk. "I decked thee also with ornaments, and I
put bracelets upon thy hands and a chain on thy neck. And I put a jewel on thy
forehead, and earrings in thine ears, and a beautiful crown upon thy head."
What did the child do? Nothing whatever. From the word "Live" to the beautiful
crown, which was placed upon its head, it was all His work. This is what Grace
does for all who believe the Gospel.
"By Grace are ye saved." Blessed
be God in all eternity for these precious words, which are given here for the
first time in this Epistle! Salvation is by Grace, and is all from His side.
God has accomplished the mighty work for us. We could have nothing to do with
it, for it was all planned before the foundation of the world; it was done when
we were not at all in existence. And as we trust in Christ we are saved by
Grace. We do not hope to be saved at last. Nor do we work to be saved. The
Grace of God has saved us, we have eternal life and can never perish.
C. Raised us up together.
leads us on
in the mighty power of God in the production of His Masterpiece. Quickening and
Resurrection are not one and the same thing. As already stated, quickening
means the giving of life. Resurrection, however, is the placing of that given
life into the proper sphere. By the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ we
are justified. Nothing can now he laid to the charge of God's elect, nor can
there be any more condemnation (Romans viii :31-39). In Him, therefore, whom He
raised from the dead, God has given to us a new and blessed position. We are
taken from among the dead; we have received His life and now occupy in
resurrection the blessed place before God, which He occupies as the
First-begotten from the dead. We are Sons of God, the beloved of God, called
Saints, and no longer as enemies of God in a guilty distance from Him. We are
fully accepted in the Beloved. We are as near in Him to God as He is. That is
what it means, "raised us up together."
D.
Seated in Christ Jesus.
"And made us sit together in heavenly
places in Christ Jesus." This leads us still higher. Grace must do all it can
do, or it would not be Grace. God is going to get now the highest Glory for
Himself by making known the riches of Mercy towards those who are in Christ. If
He had stopped short of the wonderful declaration before us, His Grace would
not have been exhausted. It would be unfinished. But He has done it all.
Besides giving us life and placing us in the blessed position as sons in
resurrection, He has seated us in Christ Jesus in the heavenly places. Quite
often the statement is quoted as "made us sit together in heavenly places with
Christ Jesus." This is incorrect. We are not seated with Christ, but in Christ.
When He comes again, we shall be with Him and share His glory. Here we have the
very summit of Christian position.
We are not alone representatively,
but also virtually, sitting in Christ in the highest Glory. Not alone have we
life in Him, but He is our life. Therefore our life is hid with Christ in God.
In Him, who is our life, we are seated in the heavenly places. How far above
man's thought and expectation all this is! Who would ever have dared to reach
as high as that! And how little we can enter into the fullness of all this. Yet
it is given to us to enjoy now in faith by believing what God hath told us,
without being able to com-prehend its heights and depths. Oh! that indeed the
eyes of our hearts may be enlightened, that we may know the hope of His
calling. It is worth the while to review in a brief word the blessed
revelations given in the first six verses of this chapter.
We saw first
what man is by nature. Dead in trespasses and sins; this stands in the
fore-ground. Enemies of God under the Prince of the Power of the Air; this is
the result of such a condition. Children of Wrath, because we are dead, His
enemies and linked with Satan.
And now God has come in with His mighty
Power in the production of His Masterpiece. He gives life so that the dead
condition is ended. Instead of enemies, we are constituted, by the resurrection
of His Son, beloved sons of Him-self. And in Christ Jesus, He makes of us
children of Glory, instead of children of Wrath. Marvellous Masterpiece of God!
May we praise Him for it all.
But one must ask in view of such riches
of Grace, as revealed in the preceding verses, What is the purpose of all this?
The verse which follows gives the answer. We find ourselves face to face with
the purpose of Glory in the destiny of His Masterpiece.
3. The Destiny of the Masterpiece.
"That in the
ages to come He might show the exeeding riches of His Grace in His kindness
toward us in Christ Jesus." Verse 7.
In the first place let us notice that
the little word "us" now refers to all, the "together" in verses five and six,
believing Jews and Gentiles. The Masterpiece of God is not so much the
salvation of the individual as it is the church, the body of Christ into which
believing Jews and Gentiles are put by the Holy Spirit. Only once was this
great truth mentioned at the close of the first chapter, when we read that
Christ is the head of the church, "which is His body, the fulness of Him that
filleth all in all." We have refrained from enlarging on this fact that the
church, the body of Christ, is God's Masterpiece, because in the second half of
this chapter and in the one which follows the truth concerning the church is
more fully revealed. The verse before us revealing the destiny of God's
Masterpiece is one of the richest and deepest of the whole Word of God. It is
strange that some of the leading and most analytical expositors of Ephesians
have failed to grasp its meaning. They apply it in a way which is all out of
keeping with the scope of the first part of this chapter. "The ages to come"
are explained by them as the present Christian age; of the different periods of
our dispensation, they speak of "ages." Their interpretation is, that God shows
now in this dispensation, in every period of it, the exceeding riches of His
Grace in those who are in Christ. Anyone can see that this view is incorrect,
for the Word of God never speaks of a dispensation being composed of
ages.
"The ages to come" are future ages, which follow the present age.
This verse forms a kind of a mountain-peak in this Epistle. We look into the
past eternity without a beginning and hear what God willed before the
foundation of the world; we look in the future and hear of "ages to
come."
The greater part of evangelical Christendom holds a very hazy
and decidedly unscriptural view concerning the "ages" of time and eternity. The
different ages of the past, the present age and the ages to come are something
foreign to many Christians. The great dispensational truths of the Word of God
have been grossly neglected. It has avenged itself in a fearful way. The enemy
has taken advantage of this. Evil teachers like the notorious "Pastor Russell,"
with his "Plan of the Ages," etc., have brought out a little of the
dispensational facts, but mixed with it the most deadly, soul destroying
errors, which are a curse to the professing church and by which thousands have
become ensnared. The prevailing idea, that the present age in which we live, is
the last age, and that when it ends no other age will follow, has no foundation
whatever in the Scriptures; it is totally unscriptural. The present age will
end. How it ends and that another age will follow is fully revealed in the
prophetic Word. The coming age is that of "the dispensation of the fulness of
times" (Chapter 1:10), the Kingdom age, when the Kingdom will be established on
this earth and the Lord Jesus Christ will exercise His Kingly rule and
authority, showing forth His Kingly Glory. When the Kingdom age ends and this
earth is consumed by fire (2 Peter iii :10) there will be a new heaven and a
new earth. Then the eternal state - the eternal age - is reached.
Of
this we read here and a revelation is given concerning these ages to come. God
is going to make known His Glory through and in His great Masterpiece. The word
"show" means "to exhibit"-"to display." His purpose concerning the future then
is "that in the ages to come He might display the exceeding (surpassing) riches
of His Grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus." The age in which we live
loves to display. Every few years there is an "exposition" somewhere, when all
the great achievements of the age are displayed. Man in his day prides himself
with his power. But this boasting age will end in the predicted crash, when all
high things will be laid low and this boasting, Christless civilization will be
swept by the fires of divine displeasure and judgment. It is then, when the
present age closes and man's display comes to a sudden end, that God will begin
His display, His exposition.
He opens the Heavens and brings forth Him,
who is now unseen, the Man in Glory at His right hand. His Glory will cover the
Heavens, when He shines forth in His royal Majesty and comes in great power and
glory. What a day it will be when He sends Him back, the First begotten from
the dead! And He will not be alone. His Saints follow Him. Each reflects the
Glory of Himself. The Son brings His many sons into glory. He is then glorified
in His Saints and admired in all them that believed (2 Thess. i:10). What a
wonderful display of power and glory that will be! God displays His
Masterpiece; the Christ, the Head and the Body. He shows to all the beings of
the Universe what He has accom-plished, and thus displays the surpassing riches
of His Grace. Throughout the Kingdom age this unspeakable display will
continue. The Lord and His Church will be together in the Glory of the new
Jerusalem and will reign over all.
But this is not all. In the eternal
age, from eternity to eternity, God is continuing in this. He will bring forth
something new in Glory, new riches of Himself for those who are one with His
well beloved Son. From eternity to eternity He displays the surpassing riches
of His Grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. How one is overwhelmed in
the pres-ence of such a statement! And how little after all we can understand
all those coming riches in Glory. What a destiny! The heart may well cry -
nothing but Glory! What is the little suffering, the little while down here, in
comparison with such never ending Glory!
A word of caution here is also
needed. Of late the teaching is being circulated that in eternal ages God will
work towards a restitution of all things. These unscriptural teachers call
themselves "reconciliationists." According to them the ages to come will bring
God's grace to all the lost and they will be saved. But where does it say this?
Certainly not in the Word of God. Their theories are obtained by a process of
reasoning. The passage here speaks only of those "in Christ
Jesus."
4. Saved by Grace through
Faith. Verses 8-10.
A. The Positive
Statement. Verse 8.
"For by Grace are ye saved through faith;
and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God."
And now once more the
Spirit of God emphasizes this great fact "saved by Grace." Salvation and all it
includes is the gift of God. But what about faith? Is that also the gift of
God? Assuredly. It is not of ourselves to be able to believe and accept God's
Word, nor is it an accomplishment which is to our credit; but it is God's gift.
Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. In a day when the
counterfeit Gospel, the Gospel of works and character building, is almost
universally preached, a Gospel, which is not of God, but which has the curse of
God resting upon it (Gal. 1:8), may we cling the closer to the solid rock,
which will abide forever "saved by Grace."
B.
The Negative Side: Not of Works. Verse 9.
"Not of works lest any
man should boast."
The works of man have nothing to do with salvation.
Alas! how many try to gain favour with God by doing. The religious Pharisee who
stood in the temple and told God what he had not done and what he was doing as
a religious man, has thousands of followers in Christendom today. Man has no
works. We are by nature positively and negatively bad. We have never done a
good thing. If righteousness and with it salvation were by the law, then Christ
would be dead in vain. And how strange that some say that they believe
salvation is not of works, but by Grace, and then assert, that if they are
saved and wish to remain saved, they must work!
C. His Workmanship. Verse 10.
"For we are His
workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before
ordained that we should walk in them."
This is linked closely with the
foregoing statement. We have no works; nothing we do or have done can save us.
But God has worked. We are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus. We are in
Him, His new creation. By giving to us the new nature, His life, He has called
us "unto good works." Fruit to the praise of His Glory is the result of Grace.
"This is a faithful saying and these things I will that thou affirm constantly,
that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works"
(Tit. iii :8). Fruit unto God is the blessed result of being in Christ and
abiding in Him (Rom. vii:4 and John xv:5). Saved by Grace is witnessed to by a
holy walk. The man who says, "Saved by Grace" and walks constantly in
unrighteousness and brings no fruit, shows that his profession is spurious.
continued