“Saved by Grace Alone—This is All My Plea”

By Jim Townsend *

* Jim Townsend is a graduate of Emmaus Bible College and for the past twenty years has been the Bible Editor for Cook Communications in Elgin, Illinois.

An Exposition of Ephesians 2:8-10

Introduction

An acquaintance of mine once told how he became a Christian. During his pre-Christian period a Christian evidently asked him out of the blue if he had ever been “saved.” My acquaintance was obviously quite unfamiliar with Christian jargon. He thoughtfully considered the question and responded, “Yes, I remember being out swimming in a lake as a kid. I felt a powerful undertow catch me and pull me down. I would’ve drowned, but someone jumped in and saved me.”

Paul Little related a similar misunderstanding with reference to familiar Christian terminology. During the days of hippiedom a young person spotted on a billboard the old words “Jesus Saves.” “Hmm,” thought the hippie, “I suppose if Jesus was thrifty, I ought to be thrifty too.” [1] That was the message communicated to this individual who hadn’t been initiated into a Christian understanding of what it means to be “saved.”

The Subject of Salvation

The term salvation is used ninety times in Psalms and Isaiah alone in the King James Version. The word savior is found thirty-nine times in the Bible (KJV). The verb save occupies close to three columns in Young’s Analytical Concordance to the Bible. Salvation is a subject of indispensable import to the message of the Bible.

Inherent in the very concept of salvation is some dire need—something to be saved from. Romans 5:9 speaks of being “saved from [God’s] wrath.” “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Timothy 1:15). Since “all have sinned” (Romans 3:23), “God our Savior…desires all…to be saved” (1 Timothy 2:4).

The heart of the human problem is the human heart (Jeremiah 17:9). We need salvaging from the wreckage caused by sin. God’s diagnosis is sin; God’s prognosis is salvation. An old hymn declared:

God could not pass the sinner by;
[Our] sin demands that [we] must die.
Yet in the cross of Christ we see
How God can save us righteously.

Salvation is heaven’s remedy for the human malady. Perhaps there is no passage in Scripture which sketches the salient features of salvation so clearly as Ephesians 2:8–10.

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them (Eph. 2:8–10).

In this golden text the chassis upon which the subject is framed is the verb “you have been saved.” In the Greek language this is the perfect tense which amalgamates a past event and a present effect (ἐστε σεσῳσμένοι, este sesōsmenoi).We might freely render this verb, “you stand saved” or “you have been saved and remain so.” The audience of the apostle in the present and in the past stood in a state of salvation. When George MacDonald (a mentor for C. S. Lewis) said as a believer, “I do not count myself saved” until he arrived at heaven, it would appear he had not adequately grasped the reality of the perfect tense in Ephesians 2:8. [2]

True, salvation comes packaged in three tenses—(1) the past (as signified by the Greek perfect in Ephesians 2:8); (2) the present (“to us who are being saved;” 1 Corinthians 1:18); and (3) the future (“we shall be saved;” Romans 5:9).

After his life-rerouting Aldersgate experience (in 1738), John Wesley nailed his colors to the mast, so to speak, by selecting as his subject before his old university the text of Ephesians 2:8. A. Skevington Wood penned, “Like the strong, opening chords of a Beethoven symphony, sermon number one announced the theme which dominated the whole of Wesley’s message.… This was how his evangelical manifesto before the University of Oxford, on the eleventh of June, 1738, stated the presupposition of the gospel.” [3]

God, then, is in the salvage business, and His rescue mission is still very much in effect.

The Cause of Salvation

For by grace you have been saved.

“Grace—’tis a charming sound, harmonious to the ear,” exulted the hymnwriter.

Salvation has its source (and course)
In God’s grace as its sovereign source.
Of human merit ’tis without a trace,
For it is grounded in God’s grace!

Actually in the original language the noun grace is preceded by the definite article. Consequently, “by ‘the grace,’ the article indicates the grace mentioned before at [vs.] 5, and bracketed with mercy, love and kindness.” [4]

An old acronym has attempted to define “grace” as:

God’s
Riches
At
Christ’s
Expense.

Not bad. One of my mentors, Dr. James B. Crichton, defined grace as “sheer generosity flowing down from God, filtered through the cross of Christ, to undeserving, ill-deserving, hell-deserving sinners.” As another hymnwriter capsuled it:

What condescension
Bringing us redemption.…

Grace is always condescensional—that is, on a downward decline. As the hymn goes on to say:

Stooping to woo, to win, to save my soul.

Grace is perhaps most frequently defined as undeserved favor. Thus, we are all celestial charity cases. No one gets to heaven except through spiritual welfare! The creative contemporary novelist, Frederick Buechner [pronounced BEEK-nuhr], said it superbly. “There’s no way to earn it or deserve it or bring it about any more than you can deserve the taste of raspberries and cream or earn good looks or bring about your own birth.” [5]

Grace (Eph. 2:8) is often distinguished (perhaps by way of oversimplification) from mercy in this way: grace is God giving us what we don’t deserve (namely, salvation), whereas mercy is God withholding from us what we do deserve (namely, judgment).

Charles Wesley expanded upon this grace-theme exquisitely when he rhymed:

Had not Thy grace salvation brought,
Thyself we never could desire;
Thy grace suggests our first good thought,
Thy only grace doth all inspire.
By nature only free to ill,
We never had one motion known
Of good, hadst Thou not given the will,
And wrought it by Thy grace alone.
’Twas grace, when we in sin were dead,
Us from the death of sin did raise;
Grace only hath the difference made,
Whate’er we are, we are by grace. [6]

Lest we miss the nature of what “grace” really is and excludes, the apostle further amplified his meaning in Ephesians 2:8a and 9 (which we consider under “Clarifying Clauses for Salvation”).

The Channel and Condition of Salvation

For by grace you have been saved through faith.

The apostle Paul favors the noun faith while the apostle John confines himself exclusively to the cognate verb believe. “Faith” is belief, and to “believe” is to exercise faith. F. W. Beare commented, “Faith for Paul is the necessary correlative of grace.” [7] We are participants simply by becoming recipients. J. B. Phillips capsuled the concept neatly in his paraphrase of Romans 3:27. “The whole matter is now on a different plane—believing instead of achieving.” [8]

The Council of Trent (1545–1563) was the religious reaction to the Reformation. The Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent (chapter XVI, canon IX) affirmed:

If anyone says that by faith alone the impious [person] is justified in such [a way] to mean that nothing else is required to cooperate in order to the obtaining the grace of justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, let him be anathema [or accursed]. [9]

Apparently the apostle Paul must be under such an “anathema,” for he supplies no other stipulation to salvation than that we come “through faith.”

Martin Luther commented, “A Christian…needs no works in order to be justified and saved, but receives these…from his faith alone.” [10] In The Scripture Way of Salvation John Wesley noted that faith “is the condition, and the only condition.… No [one] is justified till he believes; every[one], when he believes, is justified” (3:1). [11]

While faith is the one human condition for salvation, there is no merit attached to such faith. An illustration may help. In eating we resort to food and a fork. The nutritious vitamins lie completely in the food. There are no valuable vitamins in the fork. Nevertheless, we use the fork merely as the instrument by which we take the food into our being. The fork is analogous to faith; it is the vehicle by which we receive Christ (in whom is all salvation’s value) into ourselves. So Alfred Martin observed, “Paul never says [we’re saved] on account of faith, for faith is not the cause, [but] only the channel through which salvation comes.” [12] Therefore, “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved” (Acts 16:31).

Clarifying Clauses for Salvation

and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.

Ephesians 2:8b and 9 constitute Paul’s amplified version of what is meant by the expression “by grace” in verse 8a.

First, Paul announced that such salvation is “not of yourselves.” Salvation is neither self-induced, self-initiated, nor self-improvised. In short, there is no self-salvation. (The King James Version’s “save yourselves” in Acts 2:40 is retranslated “Be saved” in the NASB.) God’s salvational program is totally other than Frank Sinatra’s familiar song title, “I Did It My Way.”

Before further commenting we must note the soccer ball of debate which swirls around the small word “that” introducing the preceding clause. Actually, “that” is “this” in Greek. Bible commentators adopt essentially one of two positions: (1) that “that” refers to the whole scheme of salvation, or (2) that “that” refers to “faith” in particular, so that even faith comes to us as a gift from God.

The first view is held by T. K. Abbot, F. F. Bruce, C. Leslie Mitton, Alfred Martin, George Harpur, Harold Hoehner, and A. T. Robertson. Generally commentators argue on grammatical grounds that since “that” is neuter and “grace” and “faith” are feminine gender words, then the neuter pronoun must be more inclusive than merely “faith.”

The second view is espoused by Chrysostom, Jerome, Erasmus, Theodore Beza, Johann Bengel, Abraham Kuyper, H. C. G. Moule, E. K. Simpson, and William Hendriksen. Moule argues that “and that” introduces an additional thought to the preceding (as it does in 1 Corinthians 6:6 and 8). [13] Further, the more thoroughgoing Calvinists observe that in Philippians 1:29 faith can be viewed as a gift, for “it has been granted…to believe in Him.”

Secondly, gracious salvation “is the gift of God” (2:8b). This particular Greek word (δῶρον, dōron) is found only here in Paul’s writing although Paul does elsewhere use another word (δῶρημα, dōrēma [Rom. 5:16]) for “gift.” Also, in Romans 6:23, “the gift (χάρισμα, charisma) of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

One devotional story tells of a poor girl in England who wandered far from her impoverished home. In her wanderings she came upon a large fenced-in garden containing a profusion and variety of gorgeous flowers. A richly dressed young woman inside the enclosure spotted the girl outside who was wistfully eyeing the flowers. The young lady asked the girl if she would like some flowers and began to pick them quite lavishly for her. The poor child felt awkwardly for her single coin and clutching it, responded, “Surely I can’t buy all those flowers for this little bit of money.” To this inquiry the young woman replied to the astounded child, “My father is the King of England. He loves to give them away!”

As the poet James Russell Lowell put it:

’Tis heaven alone that is given away;
’Tis only God can be had for the asking.

If salvation is a gift, then (thirdly) the corollary follows: it is “not of works” (2:9a). Romans 11:6 paints the mutually exclusive ideas: “And if by grace, then it is no longer of works; otherwise grace is no longer grace.”

One ancient Jewish midrash on the Psalms grasped this notion correctly when the Jewish writer said, “It was not for their works that the Israelites were delivered from Egypt…and not by their works that the Red Sea was cloven in sunder, but…Moses told the Israelites, ‘Not through your works you were redeemed.’” [14]

Article eleven of the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England clearly specifies, “We are accounted righteous before God only for the merit of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ by faith, and not for our own works or deservings.” [15]

There is an old poem (source unknown) that gets the cart and the horse in the right order when the poet said:

I cannot work my soul to save,
For that my Lord has done,
But I would work like any slave
[Out of] love for God’s dear Son.

Or as hymnwriter Augustus Toplady penned:

Not the labors of my hands
Can fulfill thy law’s demands.

Rather,

Thou must save—and Thou alone. [16]

Furthermore, commentators have observed that Paul does not merely outlaw the “works of the law” but “works” period. Andrew Lincoln wrote, “It is extremely unlikely, in a letter [like Ephesians’ written] to predominantly Gentile readers, in which the only reference to [nomos], ‘law’ (2:15) occurs in a passage reminding Gentiles of what God did…that ‘works of the law’ are still in view.” [17]

If salvation is “not of works” (2:9a), then all bragfests are ousted (“lest anyone should boast”). As John Murray declared, “Faith is self-renouncing; works are self-congratulatory.” [18] Compare Romans 3:27. With the hymnwriter we must affirm:

Boasting excluded; pride I abase—
I’m only a sinner saved by grace. [19]

No peacock struts or self-congratulating touchdown end-zone dances are suitable for entering heaven’s portals.

The Consequence of Salvation

For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them (Eph. 2:10).

In a November 15, 1942, cartoon for Young People’s Weekly a Chicago cartoonist depicted a scene where the horse and cart are in reverse order. Actually, the horse is facing the driver in the cartoon. How many people in the religious realm have the tail wagging the dog!

In sound biblical theology, works are the fruit, not the root of salvation. They constitute the outcome—the outflow and overflow—rather than the origin of salvation.

In English versions (though not in the Greek text) there is a play upon words—“not of works.… For we are His workmanship.” T. K. Abbot noticed that “the argument turns on [the pronoun ‘His’], which is emphatic, ‘His workmanship we are’” [20]

The word “workmanship” is a colorful one, only appearing elsewhere in the New Testament at Romans 1:20 (ποίημα, poiēma). In Romans 1:20 it refers to God’s handiwork in nature; in Ephesians 2:10 it refers to God’s handiwork in human nature.

From the Greek word poiēma here we derive our English word “poem.” In Paracelsus the poet Robert Browning wrote:

God is the perfect poet,
Who in creation acts his own conceptions.

Sir Thomas Browne similarly offered the opinion, ”My life has been a miracle of thirty years; which to relate to were not a history, but a piece of poetry.” [21]

Just as Ephesus (home to the original readers) housed one of the seven masterworks of the ancient world, so the Ephesians were (and we are) God’s masterpiece. As His poetry we express the rhythm, cadence, and meaning of His craftsmanship.

God’s “workmanship” is qualified by the following phrase—“created in Christ Jesus for good works.” Genesis 1 supplies the account of the old creation. In Ephesians 2:10 we meet a phenomenon—in one sense—placed on a par with Genesis 1, for Christians are described as a new creation (cf. 2 Corinthians 5:17).

This new creation is portrayed as happening “in Christ Jesus.” Note the carry-over of the phrase twice from verses 6 and 7. Andrew Lincoln commented, “‘In Christ Jesus’ here is shorthand for ‘through God’s activity in Christ.’” [22]

An old axiom has it that we are saved through faith alone, but that such saving faith never remains alone—it is accompanied by corroborative works (as James 2:24 would indicate). “Good works do not make a man good,” said Martin Luther, “but a good man will do good works.” [23] Good works are the resulting outflowering of salvation’s seed.

God’s gracious salvation is not produced by works, but it produces works. Like any good watch, we should be full of good works! Compare Titus 3:8. These are “works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10). Christians are “predestined to be conformed to the image of [God’s] Son” (Romans 8:29), and God has preplanned for us a pattern (or a path) of worthwhile works. Therefore, in contrast to the path in which we “once walked according to the course of this world” (Eph. 2:2), “we should [now] walk in” a path of good works (2:10).

After Hamid Andalib, an ex-Muslim, discovered the unconditional love of the God of Christianity, his life was characterized by good works. He has raised funds for the mentally disabled. He has served on a local Human Rights and Human Relations Committee which deals with discrimination issues. As a restaurant owner, he has given away thousands of dollars worth of food. He has co-founded a youth outreach program to help teens by preventing drug addition. He has participated in a local program enabling over twenty young people from low-income housing to attend college. And he has invited annually over three hundred senior citizens to his restaurant for a free Thanksgiving meal. Hamid Andalib is a real-life laboratory test tube in which the chemistry of salvation is being transmitted into good works attractive to others.

John Wesley would heartily approve of Hamid, for he said that believers ought to do all the good they can to as many as they can as often as they can for as long as they can. Grace, which is mutually exclusive of works for salvation (Romans 11:6), really works.

Notes

1. Paul Little, How to Give Away Your Faith (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 1966), 55.
2. George MacDonald, Getting to Know Jesus, (New Canaan, CT: Keats Publishing Co., 1980), 41.
3. A. Skevington Wood, John Wesley: The Burning Heart (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1967), 225.
4. George Harpur in A New Testament Commentary, edited by G. C. D. Howley (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1969), 463.
5. Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking: A Seeker’s ABC (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1993), 38.
6. Quoted by Ernest Rattenbury, The Evangelical Doctrines of Charles Wesley’s Hymns (London: The Epworth Press, 1941), 123–124.
7. F. W. Beare, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians (London: Adam and Charles Black, 1959), 119.
8. J. B. Phillips, The New Testament in Modern English (New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc., 1958), 315.
9. Quoted in Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1941), 512.
10. Quoted in Eerdmans Handbook to the History of Christianity, edited by Tim Dowley, John H. Y. Briggs, Robert D. Linder, and David F. Wright (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1977), 360.
11. Quoted by Geoffrey W. Bromiley, Historical Theology: An Introduction (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1978), 341.
12. Alfred Martin in The Wycliffe Bible Commentary, edited by Charles F. Pfeiffer and Everett F. Harrison (Chicago: Moody Press, 1962), 1306.
13. H. C. G. Moule, The Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Ephesians, Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1910), 73.
14. Quoted in William Sanford LaSor, David Allan Hubbard, and Frederick William Bush, Old Testament Survey (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1982), 159–60.
15. John Howe, Our Anglican Heritage (Elgin, IL: David C. Cook Publishing Company, 1977), 49.
16. Augustus M. Toplady, “Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me,” in Hymns of Truth and Praise (Ford Dodge, IA: Gospel Perpetuating Publishers, 1971), Hymn #369.
17. Andrew Lincoln, Ephesians WBC, vol. 42 (Dallas: Word Books, publisher, 1990), 112.
18. John Murray, The Epistle to the Romans NICNT, 2 vols. (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1968), 1:123.
19. James M. Gray, “Only a Sinner,” in Hymns of Truth and Praise, Hymn #308.
20. T. K. Abbott, Ephesians and Colossians ICC (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1909), 52.
21. Quoted by Frank Gaebelein, Christianity Today (July 31, 1970): 25.
22. Lincoln, Ephesians, 114.
23. Bruce Shelley, Church History in Plain Language (Waco: Word Books, 1982), 260.