After reading Doug Wilson’s excellent post on Ephesians chapter 1 I wanted to create my own outline of Paul’s prayer in the first fourteen verses of this chapter. I find it helpful for me to parse Paul’s writing into a logical outline in order to really begin to grasp his intended meaning. I’ve posted it below, and I hope you find it helpful.
Ephesians 1:3-14:
- Praise God, who have given us every blessing in our future heavenly home
- He chose us for these blessings before the creation of the world, and he chose us in order to make us holy in His eyes
- Because of His love he picked us for adoption, as his very own children, according to His own purpose
- His purpose in this predestination is for the praise of His grace
- Our forgiveness and redemption, which make us holy in God’s eyes, is through Christ very own shed blood
- He has lavished this grace on us wisely, and again for His own purpose, which is a plan from the beginning of time to unite all things in Christ
- This inheritance has been predestined for us, according to God’s perfect will
- When we heard the truth of the gospel and believed in Christ and His promises, we were sealed with promise of the Holy Spirit
- The Holy Spirit is the guarantee of our salvation until the day God calls us home
The density of this is astounding, but at the same time standard for Paul’s writings. I feel as if I could understand this basically in 2 minutes. But to truly comprehend the depth, breadth and truth of this would take a lifetime.
