Ephesians 2:5

even though we were dead in offenses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you are saved!—

This is a verse of opposites.

"Dead" is the opposite of "alive."
What we did is the opposite of what He did.
"We were dead" is the opposite of "We are saved."

And the difference maker is the grace of God. Halleluyah

Dead v. Alive

What can be more opposite than dead versus alive?

God made man and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (Genesis 2:7). He did not have to do anything to have life; life was given to him, but he had to do something to enter into death.

He was told that if he disobeyed God in the matter of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, he would die (Genesis 2:16-17).

The immediate consequence was knowing that he was naked. He saw himself in a new light, as exposed, unprotected, incomplete, and needy (Genesis 3).

Those were confused and very strange emotions. Before sin, he never saw himself as exposed, unprotected, incomplete. But God had declared that on the day he eats of it, he will die. And God is not a liar. Adam and Eve surely died, but maybe they did not know it yet.

There were immediate consequences.

Many people are walking all over the world now, as Adam and Eve were; they are walking about exposed, unprotected, incomplete, and with unmet needs.

But God did not leave Adam and Eve in that state. He came to them and replaced the leaves they had ineffectively provided to cover, protect, and complete themselves.

He killed a lamb, which, I believe, points to Jesus (John 1:29), and covered them with its skin.

We versus Him

The action that typified humanity in that verse was our being dead in offenses. We did it to ourselves. We are the culprits; we are to blame.

In his letter to the Romans, Paul carefully laid out the case against humanity, whether Jew or Gentile. He concludes by saying all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). We were not giving glory to God as we should because we were sinning.

So what did God do?

God made us alive with Christ. He said I am going to overlook all that sin, and I am going to make you alive in Christ. That is grace. He counted the sacrifice of Jesus adequate enough.

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for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. But they are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. (Romans 3:23-24)

If there is something that needs to be impressed in our hearts, it is that we were responsible for our being dead (we did it to ourselves, showing that we are limited); but we are not responsible for our being made alive, which is the definition of God's grace (God did it to us to show that He is limitless).

Even though we inherited death from Adam (Romans 5:12, 1 Corinthians 15:22), our being dead in sins and offenses was still our fault, meaning we are faulty.

John was adamant when he said:

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If we say we do not bear the guilt of sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. (1 John 1:8)

The point is, if we say that's Adam, that's not me, we have crossed into self-deception. We are guilty of sin because sin is sourced from within us (Romans 7:17). There is no arguing that.

Yes, it is an inherited death (our collective lot); it is also our default/fault individually, since we have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

We were born into sin (Psalm 51:5), but we were made alive together with Christ (John 3:3). We died in the first Adam, so let no one deceive himself into thinking he does not bear the imprint of sin.

But that's not the end of our story. We have now been made alive in Christ together with Christ. Not before Christ, not after Him, but together with Him. Our destiny was written with the ink of the blood of Jesus. You, even you who are coming to Christ hundreds, nay thousands of years after.

We were dead v. We are saved

On our own, we were dead, but with Christ, we are made alive.

Paul summarised it this way: "by grace you are saved!"

He defined salvation as what God made to happen to us in Christ. And death is what we made happen to us before that.

Just as Christ cannot die again, so also we cannot die again (John 11:25-26), because our being alive is not in ourselves, but in Christ. That is the truth. Being saved, therefore, is our permanent reality, no matter what happens.

Ephesians 2:4 talks about the great love with which God loved us.

Therefore, our being saved is not for Him to check a box. It is not a business transaction; it was love. God loves us in a special way. That is the truth. Not because of what we might do, have done, or are doing.

We are glued to God by His love, not by our actions or inactions.

It seems to me that grace is love in action. So by the love of God in action in Christ, you are saved. That is the truth.

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