Nothing is pressed more earnestly in the Scriptures, than to walk worthy as becomes those called to Christ’s kingdom and glory. This is our exhortation to a Christian’s profession, it is our vocation.  It is a doctrine worthy of our giving serious thought to and dutiful observance.  In lowliness, humility, opposed to pride. By meekness, the excellent disposition of soul, this makes men unwilling to provoke, and not easily provoked or offended.  I encourage you to search the scriptures, to seek out the “call.”  Diligently study in an effort to empower yourself in all humility with the strength of God’s word!  Through the course of this study we will research many passages in God’s word.

Setting the Table!

Eph.2:4-10 (4) But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, (5) even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ–by grace you have been saved- (6) and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, (7) so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.  (8) For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, (9) not a result of works, so that no one may boast.  (10) For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

 5 Great Truths

1. Our faith, our conversion, and our eternal salvation, is not the mere product of any natural abilities, or of any merit of our own.  Not of works, lest any man should boast, (vs.9). These things are not brought to pass by anything done by us, and therefore all boasting is in the Lord

2. God himself is the author of this great change, and his great love is the cause of it; therefore He resolved to show mercy.  That love of God is great love, and His mercy is rich mercy, inexpressibly great and inexhaustibly rich.  Then, by grace you are saved (vs.5), and by grace are you saved through faith – it is the gift of God, (vs.8) we are delivered from sin and wrath; we are brought into a state of salvation, and have a right given us by grace to eternal happiness. The grace that saves us is the free undeserved goodness and favor of God; and He saves us, not by the works of the law, but through faith in Christ Jesus, (Gal. 3:26-27).

3. We are saved from the death of sin and have a principle of spiritual life planted in us. As physical death seals up all the faculties, sin does so to our spiritual being.  A regenerate sinner becomes a new living soul: he lives a life of sanctification, being born of God, being delivered from the guilt of sin by God’s pardoning and justifying grace.  Our spiritual life results from our union with Christ; it is in him that we live: Because I live, you shall live also.

4. We who were buried are raised up, (vs.6) when God raised Christ from the dead, He in effect rose up all believers together with him, he being their common head; and when He placed him at his right hand in heavenly places, He advanced and glorified us in and with him.  And made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. (Eph. 2:6) we are exalted to reign with him

5. This is the great design and aim of God in producing and effecting this change. With respect to others: That in the ages to come he might show, etc. (Eph. 2:7), that God is giving us as specimen and proof of His great goodness and mercy, for the encouragement of sinners to change and no longer wallow in the mire that has hold on them.  The goodness of God in converting and saving sinners is a tremendous encouragement to others who hope in his grace and mercy.  Through Christ Jesus, by and through whom God conveys all his favor and blessings to us.

With respect to those of that have been washed by the blood: For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, etc., (Eph. 2:10).  The new man is a new creature; and God is its Creator. It is a new birth, and we are born by His will.  With the understanding that we are bought with a price, that is Christ’s own blood, we can now begin to examine fully the biblical command to walk worthy!

Paul’s encouragement to the Colossians:

Col. 1:9-12(9) And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, (10) so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. (11) May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, (12) giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.

Our knowledge of the will of God must be always practical: we must know it, in order to do it.  Our knowledge is then a blessing when it is in wisdom, when we know how to apply our general knowledge to any occasion, and to suit it to all emergencies. Christians should endeavor to be filled with knowledge; not only to know the will of God, but to know more of it, grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, 2 Pt. 3:18.  Good knowledge without a good life will not profit. Our understanding is then a spiritual understanding when we exemplify it in our way of living.