Pages

Sign up to be notified of new blog post.

If you are not getting notifications of the blog posts by e-mail and would like to, click here. Make sure that you give us at least your first name.


I promise we will never give or sell your info to others.


You might also want to visit Entrusting Truth to find out more about what we do. My book and workbook Your Walk, their walk are available there as well as at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

Translate

Monday, April 8, 2013

OD4

The next phrase in Ephesians 1:4 on which we need to spend some time is, “before the foundation of the world.”  This is a temporal clause.  That is it places the action of the verse in time or sequence.  The implications of this are vast.  Peter is stating through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that God’s choice of us in Christ took place before the earth was.
Sometimes when we take the time to slow down and observe, what we see can rattle our categories

God being outside of time and not bound in sequence is not subject to this phrase that illumines our understanding.  This placement of the choice of God as happening before the foundation of the world, in other words before Genesis 1:1, further distances us from having any influence on the choice of God, either by behavior or some other merit.

This phrase helps us to understand Peter’s later statement in Ephesians 2:10 and sheds some light on passages that trouble us like Romans 9:11 – 13.  This concept of God’s sovereign choice through grace is central to all of Paul’s epistles.  It has now surfaced strongly in Paul’s contemporary, Peter.

The posts in this series:


No comments:

Post a Comment