EPHESIANS 4:17–32
… that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man … and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness
(Eph. 4:22–24).
Paul constantly anticipated the natural response of sinful people to a doctrine of complete dependence on God’s grace in salvation—that we can do what we want. But Paul says, “What shall we say then? Shall we continue to sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?” (Rom. 6:1–2). Paul exhorts believers to pursue righteousness and to crucify the sinful nature, not because we are under the law and in bondage to it, but because of our new nature (Rom. 6:5–6). As new creatures in Christ, we live as He lives, in holiness. Our ability to pursue righteousness arises out of a nature that has been reborn, that has been created to do good works (Eph. 2:10). “But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life” (Rom. 6:22).
Paul assumed that the transformed nature will produce good works, and Jesus Himself taught that a good tree produces good fruit. This teaching reveals that something more happens in our redemption than a mere legal transaction. While we are justified by grace (a legal transaction that involves no inherent change in us), God does not leave us in our sin. By God’s Spirit, we are renewed day by day and given the ability to be ever more holy.
This change happens in every Christian—a change that produces fruit. This is why the apostle can in one breath tell his readers that they are saved by God’s grace alone while in the next breath warn them that if they do not pursue holiness, they will not see God. In Galatians, Paul exhorts the believers to “Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.” He goes on to warn those to whom he had just proclaimed the assurances of being heirs to the kingdom that “he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life” (Gal. 6:8). Paul is not moving from grace to works, but is recognizing that without holiness no one will see God, that we have been brought in to the kingdom not to gratify the sin nature, but to bear fruit to the glory of God, and to increasingly reflect the image of God the Son.
CORAM DEO
1 Chronicles 13–15
John 12:1–22
WEEKEND
1 Chronicles 16–20
John 12:23–50
Consider the passages quoted in today’s study, and 2 Timothy 2:19. If you bear the name of Christ, what sins must you depart from? What areas in your life are most displeasing to God right now? Confess these to Him and take practical steps to turn from those sins.
For further study: Phil. 2:12–18 • Col. 1:19–23 • 1 Tim. 6:17–19 • 2 Tim. 2
WEEKEND