Part 1
Examining the only plan of salvation.
by Loren Stacy
At some point, we will find ourselves face to face with God. What will we answer if God asks us, “Why should I let you into My kingdom?”
Most people respond, “I’m a good person, certainly better than many people I know.” Religious people tend to add, “I pray to God and go to church [or synagogue, mosque, or temple].” Christians might add, “I invited Jesus into my heart and was baptized!”
The list of reasons goes on and on. Unfortunately, all these answers are wrong and will exclude us from God’s kingdom. Why? Because they indicate that we are trusting in our own efforts, rather than only in the fully sufficient work of Jesus Christ. Consider what Jesus says in Matthew 7:22, 23:
“On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’”
Thankfully, there is an answer that will open wide the gates of God’s kingdom to every person who can state it truthfully. It is expressed in Ephesians 2:8, 9: “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
Saved by grace
Let’s begin with a close examination of the first sentence in Ephesians 2:8: “For by grace you have been saved through faith.”
In this important sentence, the subject is you, and the verb phrase is have been saved. This is the essence of the sentence: “You have been saved.” And notice that the verb phrase is in the passive voice. If it were written in the active voice, it would indicate that the subject has acted: “You have saved yourself.” But the passive voice indicates that something or someone has acted upon the subject. In other words, something or someone other than you has saved you.
This raises questions: How have I been saved? If I am not saved by something I did or am doing, what or who saved me?
Two prepositional phrases answer these questions. By grace and through faith tell us that grace is the cause of our salvation and that faith is the means by which we received our salvation. The full sentence clearly tells us that we have not saved ourselves.
Let’s dig deeper. Grace means something good we’ve received from God that we do not deserve. Unmerited favor. The apostle Paul labors the point that anything we have earned, anything we do deserve, cannot be grace: “But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace” (Romans 11:6).
So our sentence should be understood as “By God’s unmerited, unearned, undeserved favor you have been saved.”
Believers, we are not the cause of our salvation. God is!
Through faith
The means through which a true believer receives God’s grace is faith. In the New Testament, faith is usually translated from the Greek word pistis, which means a firm persuasion, an unshakable conviction, regarding God or related spiritual matters. New Testament synonyms are belief and trust. The faith through which true believers have been saved is absolute trust — trust in God’s Word and promises and trust in Jesus Christ and in what He has done.
So God’s Word tells us, “For by grace you have been saved through faith.” The rest of Ephesians 2:8, 9 tells us even more! “And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
The first sentence tells us that true believers are not saved because we have earned it or because we deserve it. Our salvation is the result of God’s good work, not our good works. But now in this second sentence, Paul hammers that point home with three crushing blows. 1) “And this is not your own doing.” 2) “It is the gift of God.” 3) “Not a result of works.” Why? “So that no one may boast.”
God desires and deserves complete credit for our salvation. Why? Because if we have been saved, God and God alone has saved us. No wonder Christ will turn away the many who will call Him “Lord, Lord” and then list their own accomplishments as if they deserve God’s kingdom. When we stand before the judgment seat of Christ, we must not do that!
“Well,” many people ask, “don’t I get credit for my faith, for believing in Christ? I chose Jesus and invited Him into my heart. Lots of people never do that, but I did! Don’t I get credit at least for that?”
Actually, no. Look at the two pronouns, this and it, near the end of verse 8: “this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God.” What do this and it refer to? Grammatically, they refer not only to grace, not only to faith, but to the whole process of being saved by God’s grace through faith. Our salvation isn’t something we’ve done but is God’s gift.
Before for
There is one final word in Ephesians 2:8, 9 that we need to discuss — the very first word in verse 8: for. The verse begins, “For by grace you have been saved. . . .” Grammatically, for serves as a conjunction connecting verses 8-10 to verses 1-7. So let’s look at Ephesians 2:1-7 beginning with verses 1-3:
And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience — among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.
This was our condition before God saved us. We were not spiritually ill; we were spiritually dead! We were incapable of changing ourselves, incapable and uninterested in choosing God, following the Evil One and our fallen natures. We were “by nature” children of wrath like the rest of fallen humanity.
But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ — by grace you have been saved — and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus (vv. 4-7).
This is what God did to save us. He raised us up from spiritual death to spiritual life in Christ. Ephesians 2:8, 9 again:
For by grace [God’s grace] you have been saved through faith [a complete trust in Christ that God created within you]. And this [your salvation by God’s grace through a God-given faith] is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
In these verses, we have the entire gospel message. God has saved us! God has saved us from Himself, by Himself, for Himself. God gets all the glory.
Correct answer
In John 11, we find a conversation between Jesus and Martha. After stating the gospel, Jesus asks Martha, “Do you believe this?” (v. 26).
That is a question we all must answer regarding Ephesians 2:8, 9. Do we believe that our salvation is the gift of God, not the result of our own good works? Or do we trust in good works in addition to Christ — in what we do or don’t do, in what we believe or don’t believe?
If we believe we are saved by faith in Christ and our good works, we don’t believe Ephesians 2:8, 9. If that is true, we may secretly fear that we may not be saved, that we may not have done enough, that we may not be obedient enough, that we are being weighed in the balances of God’s righteousness and found wanting.
But if we trust in Christ alone and truly believe Ephesians 2:8, 9, our doubts and fears concerning our eternal salvation will be replaced by confidence and joy in Christ.
If God should ask us why He should let us into His eternal kingdom, the correct answer is this: “Only because Jesus has paid the penalty for my sins. I have been saved by Your grace through a complete trust that You have given me in Jesus Christ my Lord.”
