Ephesians 2:1-10: Why Jesus Came to Earth (Part 1)

Of course, at Christmas time, we realize that the Lord Jesus came to Earth. My question this morning is, why did he come? If you had to answer that biblically, why would the Lord Jesus come to Earth, you could probably look at it from two different perspectives.

The first perspective is from the human perspective. We had a great need. And from the divine perspective, who is God that would come rescue people like us? Why did the Lord Jesus come? Well, from the human perspective, we couldn't save ourselves, and he had to save us.

From the divine perspective, there's something in God, his nature, his essence, his character, that would compel him, as it were, to save us. Today, we're going to be looking at one of the most famous passages in all the Bible.

I've probably preached this more than any other passage.

In the Bible.

And I have kind of like a three-year itch, where about every three years, I want to preach this, because it's so wonderful. Or maybe you're the kind of person that you read one section of scripture one time, and you never want to read it again.

It's so wonderful. It's sealed in your mind and locked in your mind. You say, I'll never read that passage again, because I'm done with it. Of course, you're not that way. You read a passage in the Bible, and you think, when it comes to forgiveness of sins, I just reread Psalm 51 over and over and over.

Such a balm for my soul. Or if you think about the Gospel of Jesus, according to Luke, and you get to know Christ's nature, and His person, and His work, and how He loves sinners, and comes to seek and save the lost, and you just keep reading it over and over and over.

And so this passage today is one of those passages where I love to just preach over and over and over. And by the way, just another side note. If you're ever asked to teach the Bible, let's say you're in a preaching class, and you're a man.

You get asked, you know what?

Would you please preach?

All the elders and the deacons have died in an airplane crash, and it's time for you to get up and preach. Or maybe you're a Sunday school teacher, and you have to call it sick, and you call someone and say, could you please teach me something?

This would be the passage. If you're a mom, and you're thinking, I've got the kids around the table. I don't know really what to say to the kids today. This is the passage. If you're a dad, and you're thinking, I'm training my children.

What should I tell them today? This is the passage that you should always go to. And you say, you know what? It preaches itself. You can't teach if you can't teach this passage. You can't preach if you can't preach this passage.

It's one of those passages where you think, wow, it's dark and gloomy at the beginning, but then the glory of God shines through. And I wish it wasn't in the bulletin. You probably already know the passage.

But if you don't, please turn your Bibles to the book of Ephesians, chapter 2. Ephesians 2, we're going to look at 1 through 10, verses 1 through 10. And if you're new here to the church, or you don't know how to look up things in your Bible, just go to the table of contents.

It'll say Ephesians. And here we're going to look at chapter 2, verses 1 through 10. Really a summary of Christianity. A summary of the gospel. A focus in on our need and the Savior's great deliverance.

A focus on sin and then the Savior. A focus on bad news and then the good news. And of course, if the bad news isn't really that bad, the good news isn't really that good. But if the bad news is bad, the good news is refreshing.

I would say something like this. If we're really not that bad in terms of people, and we have all kinds of morality, and we're good in society, and we just have some peccadilloes and we have some syndromes and illnesses, and we just, to err is human, then God's grace isn't really that wonderful because we're really not that bad.

But if we're really as bad as the Bible says we are without Christ and sin, then the salvation that God has, the difference between those two is a great thanksgiving and joy. And that's my purpose this morning.

To walk through Ephesians chapter 2, 1 through 10, and have you say, I am so thankful for my salvation. No matter what else is going on in the world, praise God from whom all blessings flow, I'm thankful.

Another purpose I have is that if you ever have to get up and teach the Bible, you go to Ephesians 2, 1 to 10, and you have a simple outline. I have bad news, and I have good news. It's super simple, it's laid out for you to see.

Ephesians 2, 1 through 10, and it's a story of contrasts. I have told the story before where once I was flying from Phoenix, Arizona, and it was 80 degrees, it was wintertime, and we landed in Omaha, Nebraska.

Kim and I landed, we didn't have children yet, and without wind chill, it was 20 below. And so we go from 80 degrees to 20 below, it was a 100 degree temperature change from when we got onto the plane in Phoenix to when we got off in Omaha.

And so we landed in Omaha, we turned right back around and flew back to Phoenix. No, they had interviewers there, camera people, cameramen interviewing people who had experienced such a great contrast of 100 degree temperature change.

And so my grandma and grandpa, they would always want us to come visit right away when we landed because they wanted to see us and we wanted to see them. But we didn't really have time to go to grandma and grandpa's house.

We thought, well, we'll just call them the next day and say, hi, you know, we're in town. But they saw us on TV that night before and they realized we were in town and didn't go see them. Ephesians 2, one to three talks about who we were in ourselves.

That's the bad news, that's the dark news, that's the black velvet in the jewelry store. And then chapter two, verses four through 10 talk about the good news and it's really great news in and of itself, but it is perceived by us to even be greater news because it's against the back black drop of sin.

So if you want an outline, it's super simple. It's either bad news and good news, or I think for today, because we're still around Christmas time, we'll put it this way. Verses one through three, why did Jesus come from our perspective, the human perspective?

We had a great need. And then why did Jesus come to rescue us in verses four through 10? Because of the divine perspective, who he is. And so let's look at chapter two, verses one through three to start off with the bad news, or why Jesus had to come to rescue us because we couldn't save ourselves.

Verses one through three, let me read them. And as I'm reading them, you're probably going to say to yourself, this sounds like kind of a mini summary of Romans chapter one, two, and half of three. It summarizes the dark condition of mankind, why we had to be rescued.

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 body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind.

While we were living and breathing and walking around, we were spiritually dead. We were dominated by the world system, dominated by Satan, dominated by our own sins. And the end is going to be doom, our wrath.

And so let's work through this passage here again. Humbling us, true.

Sad, yes.

But it's good for us to remember. I don't know if you thought about it this way. Sometimes we only give bad news to unbelievers so that they'll realize there's good news. The gospel of the Lord Jesus, who lived and died and was raised from the dead.

But Paul here is writing to Christians and he's reminding them about the bad news. Not so we wallow in it, not so that he's going to rub our noses in it, not that we become nostalgic about it and remember the good old days.

But for every Christian, we need to be reminded that without the Lord, where would we be? Where would we be today? Where would we be in the future? What is hell? What is heaven? So he reminds believers to look back at your life.

Even if you have to look at Christ 10 times every time you have to look at your old life, it's good for Christians to remember, this is what I used to be. Thank you, Lord, for rescuing me, rescuing me.

Why did Jesus come from the human perspective? Because we needed to be rescued. And we're going to use three words to make it easy. And they're alliterated. And so the first word is dead. Second word is dominated.

The third word is doomed, dead, dominated and doomed. This is our spiritual state. We're walking, we're talking, we're alive physically. But this is our spiritual state. And the first one you see right there in verse one.

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins. Our bodies were alive, but spiritually we were corpses. Our bodies were walking around, and we were talking and living and all that. But Paul is talking about a spiritual state.

And he says, you were dead. And of course, if you're dead, you're unresponsive. You can't save yourself. You can't do anything. You're unable to help yourself. Corpses can't do anything. So Paul uses this language of necross, you're dead.

Your spiritual condition, my spiritual condition outside of Christ was dead. This is not an exaggeration. This is not hyperbole. This is not theological overkill. This is our state. And we need to be rescued.

We couldn't save ourselves. If I had younger people here with parents that let them foolishly watch TV, I'd talk about spiritual zombies. Just kidding. I'm just kidding. I'm not kidding about the zombies, though.

These are dead men walking. Zombies. They're alive physically, but spiritually, they're just dead. And when the Bible says you're dead in trespasses and sins, it's not half dead, kind of dead, partially dead, almost dead, semi-dead.

No, this is bleak. This is completely dead, dead to wanting to obey God. It's kind of like if you take a dog and you take the dog to Niagara Falls or the Egyptian pyramids, or you take them to Grand Canyon.

They're looking around, not appreciating it. Same thing with us in terms of when we were unbelievers. We looked to God and we didn't see his kindness and his beauty. We were dead. It's like God would take his word, his law, like a needle and poke it in our hand, and we were unresponsive and we didn't care at all.

And you can go to a dead body and yell and poke and prod and beg and plead and threaten, but nothing happens. And this deadness, look at what Paul says, dead in the trespasses, plural, and sins. So we're dead in trespasses and sins.

Trespass, when I think of the word trespass, if I was going to try to teach it, I think about hunters going into fields and it says no trespassing, and you just go over and do it anyway. So it's a positive way to sin where I could go, I'm just gonna do it anyway.

The negative side or omission would be, I'm gonna miss the mark. I'm shooting an arrow and I don't hit the middle. And that's what the word sin is. So here's an active way of sinning. I'm gonna trespass and more of a passive way.

I'm trying to get to the mark, but I'm not hitting it. So for us, we weren't loving God. We weren't loving neighbor. We were dead in the trespasses and sins. Listen to what our statement of faith says, and I think it's interesting about sin.

We were utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good. And holy, W-H, inclined to do all evil, to proceed all actual transgressions. And so we were in a state we needed to be saved. Sometimes people wonder why Christians say to unbelievers,.

Are you saved?

Or you say, do you need to be saved? Well, the answer is we're gonna have to be saved because we can't save ourselves. Romans 3, there's no one who understands, none who seeks after God. Romans 8, those in the flesh cannot please God.

And so we needed help. We needed a rescue. Why would Jesus come? Because we can't save ourselves. We were dead in trespasses and sins. We're so blind to spiritual things. It's like one writer said, we're like Cyclops with an eye poked out.

Herod did not give glory to God. And that's exactly our state. And it's dark, it's gloomy, but it just makes salvation even better once we turn the corner here soon enough. This is an important doctrine.

If the church is wrong on sin, if the church is wrong on trespasses, if the church is wrong on the state of man before Christ rescuing us, it gets almost everything else wrong. It's everywhere in the Bible, but so many churches don't want to talk about sin.

I mean, it doesn't fill up congregations. It doesn't make people want to give and bring friends. That's the church that talks about sin. But you don't understand the greatness of Jesus and the birth of Christ, His life, His death, His resurrection, unless you get sin rightly understood.

You go to the doctor, and if they can't diagnose you rightly, they're not going to give you the right remedy. If you've got the wrong diagnosis, you've got the wrong cure. And so the Bible is blunt. By the way, one of the reasons I know the Bible is a divine book is because it's so blunt about sin.

And don't you think we'd want to cover that up and not talk about the sin of people, even like Joseph or David or someone else. It's humbling, that's true. But it is designed to remind us of who we were so that we'll be praising the Lord Jesus.

Well, not only dead, but there's another word that we'll use here found in verses two and following, dominated. Why did Jesus have to come? Well, we were dead in sins. We couldn't get out. Judgment was coming.

But we're also dominated. So we go from language of the crypt, the language of the funeral home to the language of shackles and chains. Dominated first here by the world system.

Do you see it?

In which you once walked following the course of this world. And so now we've got shackles and think straight jacket.

We're dead spiritually,.

But we're also enslaved or are dominated. Now, when you read verse two, in which you once walked, he's not talking about literal walking. He's talking about a lifestyle. Sometimes even Christians will say to other Christians, how's your what?

How's your walk?

Like, well, it's fine.

I don't know. I mean, I was limping a while ago, but no, no, it's talking about a lifestyle. How's your lifestyle? And the lifestyle for every unbeliever, by the way, if you've got a family member that's not a Christian,.

They need good news.

Because they're dead in trespasses and sins. They're dominated by the world system. And the world system is not don't drink, don't smoke, don't see movies. The world system is there's no God. Humans are good.

It's a way of crafting everything, the cosmos, the world system that says we don't need God. It's got everything in it from evolution to unbelief. And when you're an unbeliever, you're walking according to the world system and you're not walking according to God and his system and his rules and his laws.

You're running away from him. And sometimes we think the world is so wonderful, but what Paul says through the Holy Spirit is the world system enslaves. It gets you, it attacks you. You can't get out of it.

You can, it's like a fish hook. And we used to shoot fish on the Missouri River with a bow and arrow. And we have a reel and a test line that hooked up to it and we would shoot the fish. And the way the fish arrow was, it would go in and had a barb in it, couldn't come out because it was stuck in the fish.

So what we had to do is we had to take the arrow and we push it all the way through the fish and then we could pull the arrow out that way. What are you having for lunch? But it's a barb, it's one way you can't get out of.

So the world system, it's selling, but it's enslaving. And so unbelievers are just caught up in what the world says and does, what they think the world's value is, is forced upon them. They're dominated.

No wonder Paul says, when you're Christians, do not be conformed to this world. Because when you are an unbeliever, it's like you're in the jello mold of the world system and you're conforming to it. And instead of friendship with the world as enemy against God, that's what James 4 says, you think friendship with the world is good, it's helpful.

It's like the world is my BFF, it's my bestie, everything works great. And you think you're doing it on your own, but really it's the world that's enslaving you and its system. Well, it gets worse. It's almost like we have a dimmer switch and it keeps getting darker, darker, darker before verse four, where then the light goes on.

Not only are unbelievers dominated by the world system, but take a look at the rest of verse two. This is an awful domination, an awful enslaving, dominated by Satan following, do you see it? The prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience.

It's like unbelievers, strike that, unbelievers are dupes of Satan. They do have the chain in the nose being drug around by Satan. They're unwilling slaves, prisoners. Jesus called Satan the ruler of this world.

Paul said to Timothy that unbelievers are held captive by Satan to do Satan's will. You're an unbeliever and you think you have your own will, free will, you do what you want. You think as an unbeliever, I thought as an unbeliever, it's the Christians who are the ones that are oppressed and enslaved and they can't do these things and they're not their own people.

But here we see it's the world system is enslaving, but also Satan is enslaving people. That's why, do you see it ahead of time, by the way, that no amount of self-help can rescue a person. No amount of education can rescue a person.

No amount of moral reform can rescue a person. It's going to have to take someone from the outside, someone who's not dead in sins, not enslaved by Satan, not enslaved by the world system. It's going to have to take a true man, a human man, a perfect man to come and rescue us, a divine man.

Dancing the devil's tune. And when Satan says to an unbeliever, jump, it is literally how high? It is, yes, sir, may I have another? Jesus said to unbelievers, you are of your father, the devil. Listen, and you want to do the desires of your father, like father, like son.

And if you just stop there, I mean, how tragic, how awful it would be. But again, Paul is reminding believers, don't forget your past. So let's just stop and do that just for a second. For those of you that are Christians, just think back.

For me, I'll think back to 1975, 1932, I'll think back to. But seriously, think back to your life before God saved you. You thought you were free, you thought you were loving the world, you thought everything was great.

Part of it, you didn't even realize your state till God showed you through probably an evangelist or a friend or a loved one the scriptures. You thought everything was fine. You were oblivious to it all.

You were one second away from eternal hell. And you're walking around like you don't even care, no urgency, nothing. And you look back at your life and you think, here's what I think. I'm sure glad I'm not that way anymore.

I'm sure glad that God made me alive in Christ. I'm sure glad that I'm alive. I'm not dead. I'm not dominated by Satan. I'm glad to have a king and a master who loves me. The end of verse 2, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience, this authority that Satan has over people, not a dead spirit, but living spirit.

Bound by the world system, bound by Satan, and bound by your own sin as an unbeliever. Look at verse 3. Dominated by your own sin, among whom we also once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind.

Our own sins, our own demands, our own dictates, we found our identity by sinning. Listen to what Paul says in Romans 6. But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient to the heart.

Because the Bible teaches if you're overcome by something, you're enslaved to it. So the unbeliever is overcome by sin, and they're enslaved to that sin. They think they're free, but they're enslaved.

And then lastly, why did Jesus come? From the human perspective, well, we were dead. We couldn't save ourselves. We were dominated. We couldn't extricate ourselves. But we also had a date with God. And here it says in verse 3 of chapter 2, and we were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.

We'll call that doomed. I mean, can you imagine if someone were to tell you when you were an unbeliever, by the way, I'm concerned for your soul, because the Bible says you're a child of wrath. That means you're going to receive wrath from God.

You've earned wrath. You've sinned against God. God is righteous and just, and your sins are going to have to be punished. God's not going to just let you off the hook. You're a child of wrath. How awful, how tragic, how dark.

So in light of those things, I wonder if there's good news. Remember, it's against God that we did all that sinning. How can we be helped if it's against God we sinned and committed trespasses? I mean, God had a law.

It was his law we broke. Love God, love neighbor. How could we expect help from God when it's against him and him only we've sinned and done evil in his sight? How could we be rescued if it's his wrath that we're under, his judgment that we've earned?

Why in the world would God ever rescue sinners like that? Why would God ever say at his own expense, the expense of his son, people that are dead and trespassed and sins, dominated by the world, dominated by Satan, dominated by their own sins, under wrath, what in the world would God ever do to save people?

What's in God that would make him want to save? So now we come to the good news. Two words that some people say, here's the gospel in two words. What are those two words in verse 4? Ephesians 2, everything turns here but God.

If you haven't heard the Martin Lloyd Jones sermon online, but God, you ought to listen to that right after you have fish for lunch. It is so good.

But God.

Now, scholars have said, what if the word wasn't but, but if it was and? We're dead, dominated, doomed, and God being holy and just, punished.

What if it was therefore?

And we're dead and dominated and doomed, therefore God to give glory to his name, punished. What if it was yet? Here, it's but God. How great are those words? I mean, the soul that sins shall die, Ezekiel says, but God.

The way the transgressor is hard, Proverbs says, but God. We've committed sins, but God. This is the gospel. The good news is good because the bad news is bad. And when you evangelize, dear Christian, you have to give the bad news before you give the good news.

I know people that walk up and, you know, God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. Great, just add on God. Paul's strategy is different. Jesus' strategy is different. John the Baptist's strategy is different.

We talk about sin, so then we talk about the Savior. There's no need for a Savior in your mind if you think you're not lost. You don't go to a doctor when you're feeling good,.

But God.

I mean, the wages of sin is death, but God. We've transgressed against God's law, but God. Here we see something that I think is unexpected. I mean, we're used to it, of course, but if you realized what would a king do if you were that sinful against a king?

I don't know what kind of king would have so much mercy and kindness and grace,.

But God.

Some have said these two monosyllabic words four-year-olds can say. Four-year-olds can get, you know what, this is bad and now this is good. New Christians can understand I was saved out of that. Lord, thank you for saving me out of that awful lifestyle.

And by the way, some people aren't saved out of unrighteousness.

They're not prostitutes.

And terrorists. They're saved out of self-righteousness and homeschooling and thinking that they're better than everybody else. But whether you're unrighteous or self-righteous, you need somebody else's righteousness because the spiritual state, even if you dress up rightly, is I'm dead, dominated, and doomed.

Is there any help for me? How am I going to go to the Lord for help when it's against Him I've sinned? Would God ever rescue me? And we know the answer. So let me give you now this good news. If the bad news was Jesus had to come to rescue us because we couldn't rescue ourselves because we were dead, dominated, and doomed, the good news is God came to rescue us.

Christ Jesus came to rescue us because of who He is. And we're going to see He's merciful. He's full of love. He is love. He's gracious and He's kind. He is not just holy and just, although that's true.

He is holy and just. There's more. Would God ever rescue us from judgment? I think we'll see the answer. And the answer we're going to see in verses 4 through, oh, we'll probably get down through about verse 7 -ish or something.

We'll look at this next week probably as well. It's going to be nothing in us that causes God's benevolent love toward us. It's not because we were better, because God looked down the corridor of time.

The reason why He did it is found in Him. If you have a friend that's not a Christian and you're a Christian, what's the difference between the two? You're the one that decided, you know what, even though I was dead and trespassed in sins, Jesus is the right answer.

Now, you did come to think that, but that's not the cause of your salvation. That's the fruit of it. The cause of your salvation is going to have to do with verses 4 through 10, and it's going to be, here's your testimony.

Anybody want to give a testimony? Some of you say, give a testimony. And here's your testimony. I was dead and trespassed in sins, but God. And He's rich in mercy. He has great love. He's gracious and He's kind.

That's my testimony. God is the one who interrupts. God is the one who saves. The cross magnifies Christ, not our worth. Christ died to prove my worth. How could anybody ever say that in light of death, doom, domination?

Robert Shuler once said, the most serious sin is the one that causes an unbeliever to say, I am unworthy.

That's not a sin to say.

That's the right way to say it. I'm not worthy. But God is the worthy one, and God magnifies Himself by saving. Why did Jesus come to the earth from the divine perspective? Why does God save sinners? Number one, He's merciful.

Do you see it?

It's right there. That's why I said the sermon, this passage preaches itself. Just explain what these things mean. With enthusiasm, but God being rich in mercy. Stop there. Rich in mercy. Sounds like we were rich in sin.

Sounds like we were dominated by sin. Sounds like Satan had us. But if we're rich in sin, God's even richer in mercy. And lots of times over the last few months, we at Bethlehem Bible Church have talked about mercy and how mercy is simply in the Bible.

There's someone that's needy, and we say, or someone says, or in this particular case, God says, I'll help to alleviate it. They're in a state of pity, and I'll do something about it. That's what mercy is.

Helping. And here, God is merciful, but He's rich in mercy. And what Paul is trying to do, he's trying to get you to do the exact same thing he was trying to get you to do in Ephesians 1, 3 to 14. Praise God.

Bless God. Blessed be the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ. And here he's trying to get you to do the same thing again. God, you're so rich in mercy. And when I'm studying a passage and when I'm preaching a passage, I do things like this, and that's why I'm going to do it with you as well.

When's the last time you said, Lord, I'm so thankful for my salvation? I ought not to be complaining. I ought not to be murmuring. I ought not to be doing these things. What I ought to be doing is celebrating your nature, your character, your essence, your goodness.

And I was in such a pitiful state, but you had mercy on me. Thank you.

When's the last time?

You should just do that right in your own hearts now. Thank you, Lord, for being merciful. Thank you for that. He is merciful. One man describes mercy this way. The self-moved, spontaneous, loving kindness of God, which causes him to deal in compassion and tender affection with the miserable and distressed.

Doesn't that sound like us before we were saved? Miserable and distressed spiritually? And here we have compassion and mercy. You can think about a mom being merciful to their children or a dad being merciful to their children.

Jesus sees a large crowd, and they're like sheep without a shepherd, and he wants to teach them because he's merciful. He has compassion on them everywhere you go. When I describe our salvation as merciful, as loving, as gracious, and as kind, we're talking about the Lord.

We're talking about Jesus, Incarnate One, who sits at the throne even now. The two blind men see Jesus. Excuse me. Did you see what I just did there? Excuse me. Let me rephrase that. The two blind men hear Jesus, and they're like, David, son of David, have what?

What do they want?

We're needy.

And for us, it's not just physical blindness.

It's spiritual.

Please have mercy. Can't you think of the tax collector when he realizes his sin? He says, what? Have what? Mercy.

Have mercy.

And this is what we pray for our unbelieving family members. Lord, would you have mercy on them? Would you be kind to them? Lord, have mercy on them. You're rich in mercy. They might be rich in sin, but you're rich in mercy.

Psalm 103, the Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy, our loving kindness. How about Micah 7? Who is a God like you who pardons iniquity, passes over the rebellious act of the remnant?

He, God, does not retain his anger forever because he delights in mercy. Delighting in mercy. You, Christian, are actually called in Romans 9 a vessel of mercy. From a vessel of wrath to a container, our vessel of mercy, because God has poured out mercy in your life.

First Peter chapter 1 verse 3, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, according to his great mercy. Why would God come to save? Nothing in us that would compel him except a sense of mercy.