Analysis: Christians Are Dead Before Salvation

Christians were dead before salvation (v.1). Once you were dead because of your disobedience and your many sins. Και υμάς όντας νεκρούς τοις παραπτωμασιν και ταις αμαρτίαις υμών. The verse starts off with the word “Once”, telling the reader that this happened before an event or to their current situation. This tells the readers of the life they lived before they believed the gospel and received salvation. Paul tells his readers that they “experienced a living death” shown through the “vicious way of life” they lived before salvation (Thielman, 2010). In the Greek text, the word παραπτωμασιν, or paraptoma, is used twice. This word means offense, wrongdoing, or sin, and shows the repetitiveness seen all over Ephesians. The word “you” (υμάς) is used as the direct object of the verb in the sentence, “he made you alive with” (συνεζςοποιησεν) which is used “some 87 words later” in verse five. (Arnold, 2010). Paul seems to use this as a method of suspense and also uses his description …show more content…
In this sentence notice that not only is God “rich in mercy,” but he also loves us. This is a stark contrast to the earlier verses about humanity deserving God’s wrath. The word “but” that starts off the passage tells the reader that there is a contrast here. Arnold describes the word ‘but’ in this context as “a brilliant ray of hope” (Arnold, 2010). It means that humanity deserves God’s wrath, nevertheless God himself loves humanity to the point where he would sacrifice his only son in order to show them mercy. The last part of the verse tells readers that his mercy is not for his benefit, but rather his mercy is inspired by love. A believer should never forget the love that God has shown them through the sacrifice of his son, which shows his great mercy and love for