Copyright Ó 2012 J. Neely
Ephesians 6:24
24 Grace [charis] be with [meta] all [pas] them that love [agapao] our [hemon] Lord [kurios] Jesus [Iesous] Christ [Christos] in [en] sincerity. [aphtharsia] Amen. [amen] To
[pros] the Ephesians [Ephesios] written [grapho] from [apo] Rome, [Rhome] by [dia] Tychicus. [Tuchikos] KJV-Interlinear
24 Grace be with all those who
love our Lord Jesus Christ with a love incorruptible. NASB
Grace, ‘charis,’ is Gods favor.
Sincerity, ‘aphtharsia,’ means incorruption,
existence, genuineness, incorruptibility.
Therefore, Gods favor comes to those who maintain a
relationship with God, through Christ. A
genuine relationship that is based on the content of the scriptures learned in
the proper way, and by means of Gods one and only method for the functional and
developing spiritual life.
Sincerity is not an emotional or well intentioned
attitude, but an adherence to the method of functioning within the spiritual
life as God intended.
Gods favor does not come to you through wishes or
hoping or wishing or good intentions or by means of your own idea of how
spirituality is supposed to work.
There is but one method, one apparatus, one
mechanism by which the spiritual life functions and succeeds, and it is defined
very well in the scriptures.
And that method is that you must first be saved by
means of believing in Christ.
Second, you must live your life in fellowship,
which is obtained by means of confession of your sins to God the Father, repetitively
on a regular basis. ‘Father, I did this
and that and this and that, etc.’
While in fellowship, you must engage in a daily Bible
study, learning, pondering, thinking, understanding, and using that which you
learn in your daily life.
And while you may be learning simple stories and
verses and words and so forth, it is not those words per se that develop your
spiritual growth, it is the function of the Holy Spirit that circulates that
information into your human spirit which helps you to discern truth from lies,
then transferring it down into your soul.
And from within your soul, that information begins
the building process or the edification process of the spiritual fortress,
spiritual mansion, spiritual temple within your soul. That construction is the framework for your
spiritual productivity (what you do in life), which in turn completes your
spiritual life.
All of this forms a strong soul, in faith, which is
the spiritual muscle of your life. Faith
is based on actual content, never on luck.
And all of this process culminates in your clear
and perspicuous view and understanding of life and truth and the world around
you.
And to you, comes Gods favor because of the
accomplishment of doctrine within you.
God does not bless you for you, but for that which is in you. Truth is the source, God, and truth is the
target, a spiritually sound soul.
Jesus Christ is the living manifestation of the written
word. Doctrine in you, places Christ in
you in a functional way.
The subscript indicates that Paul used others to
write his words. Whether he dictated and they wrote, or whether he wrote and
they copied is irrelevant. A similar comment
is written at the end of Romans and 1 Corinthians.
The subject of Ephesians is the church, its role,
its development, its obligations, its responsibilities.
You as a believer in Christ are a member of that
church, which by the way is the one and only legitimate church in
existence. It includes Adam and Eve and
every person who has ever believed in the one and only Savior, Jesus Christ.
By the end of the Millennium, there will likely be
several trillion members, when history is all said and done.
So while you are a member of the only legitimate
minority during history, you are also a member of the greatest organization,
family, nation, and army that will ever exist.
You have a phenomenal opportunity to construct your
life and determine your eternal future.
Don’t waste it through rejection, antagonism, or plain stubborn indifference.
