Ephesians — Chapter 1

Authorship & Background

Map & Geography

• Ephesus (v.1): Major city in Asia Minor (modern Turkey); location of a key early church.

Places on this map

• Ephesusnear Selcuk, TurkeyThe largest port of Roman Asia, at the mouth of the Cayster on the west coast of Asia Minor, and home to the temple of Artemis. Its harbor silted up and the ruins now sit several miles inland, which is why a great seaport has no sea. Wikipedia
• Asia MinorTurkeyThe peninsula between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean, a high dry plateau ringed by mountains with the Greek cities on its western coast. Roman Asia, the province Paul worked from Ephesus, was only its western end. Wikipedia

Towns sit on their excavated or traditional site. Regions, rivers and seas are ringed rather than dotted, because for those a single point is only an anchor. Coastlines from Natural Earth.

Deep Dive

Setting: Paul writes as a prisoner (3:1; 4:1; 6:20), most likely from his house arrest in Rome about AD 60–62, the situation where Acts ends (Acts 28:30–31). Tychicus carries the letter (6:21), and he carries Colossians too (Col 4:7), so the two letters were written close together and share much of their language. Ephesus was the capital of the province of Asia, home of the great Temple of Artemis and of a famous trade in magic (Acts 19). Paul had spent about three years there, longer than anywhere else. Unlike most of his letters, Ephesians answers no crisis. It is a wide-angle view of God's whole plan in Christ, and of the church's place in it. Chapters 1–3 lay out what God has done, and chapters 4–6 describe the life that answers it. The church has always received it as Paul's. Many modern scholars think a follower wrote it in his name, citing its style and its overlap with Colossians. Others answer that a letter of praise naturally reads differently, and that it names Paul twice (1:1; 3:1).

Greeting (vv1–2)

• "Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God" (v1). His authority is not self-appointed. "The will of God" returns again and again in this chapter (vv5, 9, 11), and it sets the tone: everything that follows starts with God's purpose, not human effort.
• "To the saints who are in Ephesus" (v1). The words "in Ephesus" are missing from several of the earliest manuscripts, including the oldest papyrus of Paul's letters and the first hands of the two great fourth-century codices. The ESV footnotes this. The letter also has no personal greetings, which is strange for a church Paul knew so well. Many scholars therefore think it was a circular letter, meant to be read in Ephesus and the churches around it. Some connect it with "the letter from Laodicea" (Col 4:16). Either way, the content is not in doubt, and Ephesus was almost certainly among its first readers.
• "Saints… and faithful" (v1). "Saints" (hagioi) means "holy ones," people set apart for God. It describes every believer, not a spiritual elite. "Faithful" here mainly means believing, people who trust Christ and hold to him.
• "Grace to you and peace" (v2). Paul joins the usual Greek greeting (chairein, "greetings") to the Hebrew shalom, and fills both with gospel meaning. Grace comes first because peace with God flows from it. "God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ" stand side by side as the one source of both.
• Commentators: Henry is pointed: "Those are not saints who are not faithful, believing in Christ, firmly adhering to him." He sums up the greeting in four words: "No peace without grace." Guzik treats the missing words calmly. He thinks the letter was meant for Ephesus but notes its message reaches every church, so readers can imagine their own city in the blank. JFB treats "saints" and "faithful" as one group described two ways, and prefers "through the will of God" for v1.

Spiritual Blessings in Christ (vv3–14)

• One sentence of praise. In Greek, vv3–14 are a single sentence of about 200 words, one of the longest in the New Testament. It reads less like an argument than a hymn. The structure follows the Trinity: the Father chooses (vv3–6), the Son redeems (vv7–12), and the Spirit seals (vv13–14). A refrain marks each part: "to the praise of his glorious grace" (v6) and "to the praise of his glory" (vv12, 14).
• "Blessed be the God… who has blessed us" (v3). This is a berakah, the Jewish form of praise that still opens synagogue prayers: "Blessed are you, O Lord." God blesses people by giving. People bless God by praising. The verb is past tense: the blessing has already been given, not merely promised.
• "Every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places" (v3). "Spiritual" means blessings that come by the Spirit, not blessings that are vague or unreal. "The heavenly places" is a phrase found only in Ephesians (1:3, 20; 2:6; 3:10; 6:12). It is the unseen realm where Christ now reigns and where the spiritual battle is fought. Believers' lives are anchored there already, because they are united to Christ, who is seated there.
• "In Christ." The phrase and its echoes ("in him," "in the Beloved") come about a dozen times in vv3–14. No blessing comes apart from him.
• "He chose us in him before the foundation of the world" (v4). The verb eklegomai means to pick out, and in the New Testament it is almost always middle voice: to choose for oneself. It is the word used of Jesus choosing the Twelve (Luke 6:13), and in the Greek Old Testament it translates bachar, God choosing Israel (Deut 7:6–7). Now that language of a chosen people is applied to everyone in Christ, Jew and Gentile alike (1 Pet 2:9).
• "That we should be holy and blameless before him" (v4). Election aims at a changed life, not only at rescue. "Blameless" is sacrifice language, used of animals without defect, and it reappears for the church as a bride in 5:27.
• "In love he predestined us for adoption" (vv4–5). The ESV attaches "in love" to "predestined" (v5). Older versions such as the KJV attach it to "holy and blameless… in love" (v4). The Greek allows both. "Predestined" (proorizō) means to decide beforehand. "Adoption" (huiothesia) is a legal word for placing someone as a son. In Roman law an adopted son lost his old debts and gained a full share in his new father's name and estate. In Romans 9:4 Paul uses the same word for Israel, so Gentile readers now share Israel's family name.
• Election and predestination: the main views. Faithful Christians have read vv4–11 differently for centuries. The Reformed (Calvinist) reading sees God choosing particular people for salvation from eternity, by grace alone, with nothing in them as the cause. Faith is the fruit of election. The Arminian and Wesleyan reading sees God choosing in light of his foreknowledge of who would believe (Rom 8:29). Another reading, held by many in several traditions, stresses that the choosing is "in him" (v4): Christ is the Chosen One (Luke 9:35), and people are chosen as they are joined to him. On this view the focus falls on a chosen people rather than on a list of individuals. All agree that Paul is praising here, not arguing, and that the doctrine is meant to make believers humble, secure and grateful.
• "With which he has blessed us in the Beloved" (v6). "Blessed" here is charitoō, built on charis, grace: literally "graced" with grace. The only other New Testament use is the angel's greeting to Mary, "O favored one" (Luke 1:28). "The Beloved" echoes the Father's voice at Jesus' baptism (Matt 3:17). Believers are loved because they are in the One the Father loves.
• "Redemption through his blood" (v7). Apolytrōsis means release secured by paying a ransom. The Old Testament background is the exodus, where God "redeemed" Israel from Egypt and the Passover lamb's blood marked the houses. The price here is Christ's death, and the first result named is "the forgiveness of our trespasses."
• "According to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us" (vv7–8). Not "out of" his riches, but "according to" them: the gift is measured by the size of the Giver. "Riches" recurs through the letter (1:18; 2:7; 3:8).
• "The mystery of his will" (v9). In everyday Greek a mystērion was a secret, especially the hidden rites of the pagan mystery religions that only initiates learned. Paul uses the word for something quite different: God's plan, once hidden and now openly announced to everyone. In the New Testament a mystery is not hard to understand, just impossible to know until God reveals it. Chapter 3 spells out its center: Gentiles are fellow heirs with Israel (3:6).
• "A plan for the fullness of time" (v10). "Plan" is oikonomia, the management of a household (the root of "economy"). It is the steward's word in Jesus' parable (Luke 16:2). God is the householder running history toward its goal.
• "To unite all things in Christ" (v10). The verb anakephalaioō means to sum up or gather up. Its only other use is Romans 13:9, where every commandment is "summed up" in love of neighbor. The picture is of scattered things brought together under one heading. It is built on kephalaion ("main point" or "sum"), though many readers also hear a play on kephalē ("head") in v22, where Christ is named head over all things. A fractured creation, divided by sin and by the wall between Jew and Gentile (2:14), will finally hold together in him (Col 1:20).
• "In him we have obtained an inheritance" (v11). The verb klēroō comes from klēros, a lot, and is used only here in the New Testament. It can mean "we received an allotted share" (ESV) or "we were made his allotted portion" (as JFB prefers). Both draw on the Old Testament, where Canaan was divided by lot among the tribes (Josh 14:2), and where Israel itself was "the LORD's portion" (Deut 32:9). God is again the one who "works all things according to the counsel of his will."
• "We who were the first to hope… In him you also" (vv12–13). Most interpreters take "we" as Jewish believers who hoped for the Messiah first, and "you also" as Gentile believers who came to faith later. If so, the theme of chapter 2 is already here: two peoples brought into one inheritance.
• "When you heard… and believed in him, were sealed" (v13). God's choosing in eternity does not cancel the human side. People hear "the word of truth" and believe. The verb (sphragizō) pictures a seal, which in the ancient world marked ownership, proved a document genuine and protected goods in transit. The Spirit is God's mark that a believer belongs to him (4:30; 2 Cor 1:22). "Promised" looks back to the prophets' promise of the Spirit (Ezek 36:27; Joel 2:28).
• "The guarantee of our inheritance" (v14). Arrabōn was a business word for a first instalment paid in advance that commits the payer to the rest. The Greek Old Testament uses it for the pledge Judah left with Tamar (Gen 38:17–20). In modern Greek the word means an engagement ring. The Spirit is not only a promise of future glory but its first share, a real taste of what is coming.
• "Until we acquire possession of it" (v14). The Greek (peripoiēsis) can mean "acquisition" or "a possession," so translations differ. The ESV reads it as believers finally taking possession of their inheritance. Other versions (KJV, NIV) read "the redemption of the purchased possession," meaning God's own people. Behind that second reading stands Malachi 3:17, where Israel is God's "treasured possession."
• Commentators: Henry calls election and predestination the "secret springs" of all the other blessings, and links them tightly to holiness: "All who are chosen to happiness as the end are chosen to holiness as the means." On the Spirit he writes, "The earnest is part of payment, and it secures the full sum." JFB stresses that God is not acting from "arbitrary caprice" but from infinite wisdom. It also contrasts the pagan mysteries: in the gospel, "All Christians are the initiated." Guzik grants the real tension between God's choosing and human responsibility, but says the doctrine is given for assurance, and that the reasons for God's choice lie in him, not in us. He describes the sealing as a mark of belonging rather than a feeling, and as something that follows faith. One correction: Guzik says arrabōn is found only in the New Testament, but the lexicon shows it in the Greek Old Testament (Gen 38) and in ordinary Greek. All three, with the Tyndale notes, read the "we… you" of vv12–13 as Jews and Gentiles.

Thanksgiving and Prayer (vv15–23)

• "Your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints" (v15). Faith and love belong together throughout Paul's letters (Col 1:4; 1 Thess 1:3). "All" matters in a letter about Jew and Gentile becoming one body. The proof of their faith was love that did not stop at the boundaries of their own group.
• "I do not cease to give thanks for you" (v16). Having praised God for what he has given (vv3–14), Paul now prays that believers would grasp it. The blessings are already theirs. What they need is eyes to see them.
• "The Spirit of wisdom and of revelation" (v17). The Greek has no article, so it could mean the Holy Spirit or "a spirit" (an inner disposition) of wisdom. Most commentators think the Holy Spirit is meant, since only he gives such wisdom (Isa 11:2). "Revelation" here does not mean new Scripture but God opening the mind to what he has already made known. "Knowledge" is epignōsis, a recognition or full acquaintance, used of knowing a person. The goal is not information about God but knowing him (John 17:3).
• "The eyes of your hearts enlightened" (v18). In Hebrew thinking the heart is not mainly the seat of feelings but the center of the whole person, where thinking, choosing and loving meet. The perfect tense pictures eyes already opened at conversion and needing to stay open. Paul prays for three things to be seen.
• First, "the hope to which he has called you" (v18). Hope in the Bible is not wishful thinking but confident expectation of what God has promised: the return of Christ, resurrection and the restored creation.
• Second, "the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints" (v18). Read carefully, this is God's inheritance, found in his people. In v11 believers receive an inheritance. Here God receives one, and it is them. The background is Deuteronomy 32:9: "the LORD's portion is his people." God counts his people his treasure.
• Third, "the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe" (v19). "Immeasurable" is hyperballō, to throw beyond the mark, to overshoot. Paul then stacks up three more power words: working (energeia, the root of "energy"), great (kratos) and might (ischys).
• "That he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand" (v20). The standard of God's power in believers is the resurrection and ascension. The same power that emptied the tomb is at work in those who believe, and chapter 2 shows what it does: it raises the spiritually dead (2:5–6). "Seated… at his right hand" is the language of Psalm 110:1, the Old Testament verse most quoted in the New: "Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool."
• "Far above all rule and authority and power and dominion" (v21). These are titles for spiritual powers, both good and evil (3:10; 6:12; Col 1:16). In Ephesus, a city steeped in magic (Acts 19:19), where spells called on the names of spirits, this was not abstract. No name outranks his, "not only in this age but also in the one to come."
• "He put all things under his feet" (v22). This quotes Psalm 8:6, where God gives humanity rule over creation. What Adam lost, Christ as the true man regains (Heb 2:6–9; 1 Cor 15:27).- "Head over all things to the church" (v22). Christ rules everything, and he rules it for the benefit of the church. "Head" here carries the idea of authority and of the source of life for the body (4:15–16). The head is "given" to the church as a gift.
• "Which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all" (v23). One of the hardest phrases in Paul. Plērōma can mean "that which fills" or "that which is filled." There are two main readings. One: the church is filled by Christ, the vessel into which he pours his life and gifts (4:10–13). The other: the church in some sense completes Christ, as a body completes a head. Christ lacks nothing in himself, but as head he is not complete without his people. Most modern interpreters favor the first reading. Either way, the church lives by his fullness, not its own.
• Commentators: Henry's rule for prayer: "We should pray for the persons for whom we give thanks." On the eyes of the heart he warns that "Christians should not think it enough to have warm affections, but they should labour to have clear understandings." He takes the second reading of v23, asking "How could he be a king if he had not a kingdom?" JFB takes the first, describing the church as "the filled-up receptacle" of Christ's gifts, and stresses that Christ's headship means both rule and union. It also notes that the oldest manuscripts read "heart" rather than the KJV's "understanding" in v18, as the ESV does. Guzik says the "spirit of revelation" here is about knowing God, not predicting events. He also notes that many believers have hearts without eyes or eyes without hearts, and leans, tentatively, toward the first reading of "fullness." The Tyndale notes take the same view, describing the church as the place where Christ's presence is expressed in the world.

Pointing to Christ

Every blessing in this chapter has the same address: "in him." The Father's choosing, the adoption, the forgiveness, the inheritance and the seal of the Spirit are all found only in union with Christ, the Beloved. The chapter then lifts its eyes to where he is now: raised, seated above every power, with all things under his feet, as Psalm 8 and Psalm 110 promised. He is head over everything, and he holds that rule for the sake of his people. The God who planned redemption "before the foundation of the world" will finish it in him, uniting "all things in Christ" (v10).

Commentary

• Enduring Word (David Guzik): enduringword.com Guzik provides thorough analysis of the Trinitarian doxology (vv.3-14), the blessings "in Christ," election, redemption, sealing, and Paul's prayer.
• Jamieson-Fausset-Brown (1871): blueletterbible.org A critical and explanatory commentary on the whole Bible, more concise than Matthew Henry and closer to the Hebrew and Greek, with attention to historical and geographical detail. Public domain.
• Matthew Henry's Exposition (1710): blueletterbible.org A devotional verse-by-verse commentary in the Puritan tradition, still among the most widely read three centuries on. Public domain.

Videos

Articles

• Crossway: crossway.org What this letter is preoccupied with that the others are not.
• GotQuestions.org: gotquestions.org On the whole book: an overview of the book of Ephesians -- who wrote it, when, why, and how it fits the rest of Scripture.

Links open on the publisher's own site. Nothing here is reproduced on this page.

Reflection

• Every Blessing Already Given (v.3) — Paul opens by declaring that God has already blessed believers with every spiritual blessing in Christ. How does it change your day to know you're working from blessing already given rather than toward blessing you still need to earn?
• Chosen Before the World Began (v.4) — God's choice of His people predates creation itself, rooted in His purpose rather than anyone's performance. Does knowing your standing with God began before you existed bring you security, or does it raise questions you're still wrestling with?
• Accepted in the Beloved (v.6) — Believers are accepted by God not on their own merit but because of their union with Christ. Where in your life do you still feel like you have to earn acceptance you've actually already been given?
• Sealed as God's Own (v.13) — The Holy Spirit is described as a seal marking believers as God's possession and a guarantee of what's still to come. How does knowing you belong to God, sealed and secure, shape how you face uncertainty?
• Praying to Actually Know It (vv.17-19) — Paul prays that believers would grasp, not just intellectually, the hope, riches, and power that are theirs in Christ. What would change in your daily life if that prayer were fully answered in you?