Ephesians 1:3

Day 2

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ” Ephesians 1:3

God the Father: Worthy of Praise
Now that Paul has completed his initial and brief greeting, we move to the next section of the letter, benediction and prayer.  This structure of the letter where the initial greeting is followed by a blessing and prayer follows closely the structure of many of Paul’s other letters to the churches.  In fact, Ephesians follows the general structure of many Jewish and Greco-Roman letters from that time.  However, Ephesians is the longest such benediction and prayer of any of the New Testament epistles and is strikingly long when compared to Jewish benedictions from antiquity or from Paul’s own day.  The blessing and prayer cover almost the entire first chapter of the book.  The actual body of the letter doesn’t actually begin until Ephesians 2:1.

The benediction begins in Ephesians 1:3 with “blessed be.”  This statement functions as a statement of fact.  God is blessed.  The “blessed be” comes from the Jewish scriptures.  The Psalms provide numerous examples of this same structure.

Here are a few examples. 

Psalm 18:46 The Lord lives, and blessed be my rock; And the God of my salvation be exalted

Psalm 28:6 Blessed be the Lord, Because He has heard the voice of my supplication.

Psalm 41:13 Blessed be God, Who has not turned away my prayer Nor His lovingkindness from me.

Psalm 72:18 Blessed be the Lord God, the God of Israel, Who alone works wonders.

Psalm 89:52 Blessed be the Lord forever! Amen and Amen.

Psalm 106:48 Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, From everlasting even to everlasting. And let all the people say, “Amen.” Praise the Lord!

Psalm 113:2 Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and forever.

We see similar statements of praise to God in this form in the New Testament.  Consider the father of John the Baptist.  Zacharias said “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for He has visited us and accomplished redemption for His people… (Luke 1:68)

“Blessed be” is a statement of fact.  God is infinitely and eternally blessed.  This statement, as can be seen from the Old Testament examples, functions as a statement of praise.  The acknowledgment by God’s people of God’s blessed condition is an expression of praise.  God is blessed.  In this verse, He is blessed or praised by those He blesses.  As much as this is a statement of fact, there is a call for us to join in the praise.  God blesses us and the most reasonable response is to praise Him, acknowledging His blessed nature.

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” begins an extensive theological discourse on the nature of Triune work of God in salvation that proceeds from verse 3 all the way to verse 14.  We will cover these theological truths in the days to come, but here at the outset, Paul reminded the church in Ephesus that God deserves our praise.  Paul’s letter provides the specific details that should motivate us to praise God.

Blessed be God…who has blessed us.  We bless God for what He has done to bless us.  This blessing comes from God to us through the spiritual blessings He brought about in us.  These spiritual blessings sit in contrast the temporal and physical experiences of this life.  The blessings from God are in the spiritual realm, the heavenly realm, the eternal and transcendent realm.  He has blessed us with “every spiritual blessing.”  It is an exhaustive list of blessings.  This list carried Paul’s pen in a single, run-on sentence of epic proportion.  This one sentence in the Greek covers verses 3 through 12, the longest sentence in the entire Bible.  Once Paul began to articulate the various blessings that flow to us from God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, the list grew in crescendo fashion.  He would have failed an English grammar lesson with this sentence, but the incredible list of blessings that are ours in the spiritual realm pushed Paul into deeper truths.  It is this list of our spiritual blessings that calls us to join Paul and the saints at Ephesus in praise of our great God.

“In the heavenly places” occurs five times in the book of Ephesians.  Ironically, these five occurrences of “in the heavenly places” represent the only five occurrences of this phrase in the entire Bible.  What is it about the recipients and their situation that prompted Paul to invoke a new terminology?  Ephesus became famous for its unfailing dedication to the local cult of Artemis.  This cult centered around a mythological story around something falling from heaven (a meteor?) and landing in the area.  The city of Ephesus viewed itself as especially blessed by the goddess whose image “fell out of the heavens.”  (Acts 19:35)  Locals turned this event into legend and cult of the idolatrous worship of Artemis.  Though Artemis (also known as Diana) was worshiped throughout the Roman Empire, the city of Ephesus viewed itself is the true worshipers of Artemis, probably due to the legend. 

Paul’s language seems to be in striking contrast to this local legend.  The Ephesians held to an idolatrous cult that viewed the blessings as falling out the heavens.  For the believer in Christ, we worship the Son of God, who truly came down from the heavenly realm.  He lived a perfect life.  He died for our sins and rose again from the dead.  He ascended back to His heavenly home and is now seated at the right hand of God in the heavenly places.  That adversary, the devil, constantly attempts to distract from the authentic with cheap, counterfeit alternatives.  While Ephesus bowed in allegiance to some object that “fell from the heavens,” the true Creator of heaven and earth had indeed stepped into our world.  While the temple of Artemis became the center piece of Ephesian pride, the true Creator of heaven and earth does not dwell in temples made with hands.  He does not need us nor depend on us for anything.  Out of His infinite and divine nature, He chooses to bless us with every spiritual blessing.  

Not only is Christ seated at the right hand of God the Father “in the heavenly places,” but we too are seated with Him.  God sees us as seated with Christ.  Just as Christ finished His work and sat down at His Father’s right hand, we are seen as already seated with Christ.  Positionally, God already sees the believer as being in Christ and with Christ in His heavenly realm.  We have already received the spiritual blessings.  From God’s perspective, our destiny is so sure as to be completely experienced in the heavenly realm.  From our perspective, we cannot see that ultimate end, but we are “in Christ” so we know these spiritual blessings with certainty.

Suggested Prayer:  Oh God, be blessed.  May my praise ever come before you.  You have blessed me with an everlasting blessing, far above all that this world will ever know or experience.  In Christ, You already see me in His completed work.  Thank You for your plan of salvation.  Thank You for blessing me by including me in Your perfect plan of salvation through Your Son, Jesus Christ my Lord.

Ephesians