Ephesians 1:3

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. (NIV)

Paul begins this section, that in the original language of the Bible is the longest sentence spanning from verse 3-14, with a declaration of blessing to the Father. Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ…This is an exaltation by Paul as well as a personal declaration. In one sense Paul is himself giving God thanks, yet in another he is encourage us to give praise to God. David Guzik in his commentary on this passage quotes Moule as saying that the idea behind blessed is, “Praised with worshipping love.” The reason for this attitude of praise and worship before God is shown in the text. Paul might have been borrowing from an Old Testament use of the phrase and making it a true Christian declaration by linking the Father to the Son.

How guilty are we at times when we fail to reach beyond ourselves and go into the Spirit within us and praise God? This is what Paul does and exalts us to do. Reach beyond our natural capabilities and going into an atmosphere of being lost in the riches and goodness of God and just break out in an unrehearsed, unplanned and selfless.

The reason for Paul bursting into this praise of loving worship is due to the fact that God has blessed him. The verb used here is in the aorist tense and the active voice. It means therefore that the subject who is God is definitely the one who has blessed. One of the factors that must be taken into consideration when translating the aorist tense is the fact that although it might indicate an action taken in the past, it does not always indicate an end to that action or a timeline to the completion of the action. So although we are blessed it is not that we have been blessed and that’s it, but it’s that we have been blessed and are still being blessed.

We have been blessed with spiritual blessings. The spiritual blessings that have been lavished on us might also be paralelled with what Peter speaks about in 2 Peter 1:3, “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.” My personal take on the spiritual blessings is that they are not confined only to the well-being of our spirits, but they also affect other areas of our lives. We live from our spirit and or immaterial self, I think that’s why John prayed “Dear friend, I pray that you may enjoy good health and that all may go well with you, even as your soul is getting along well.” (3 John 1:2)

Neither of these writings disagrees with regards to what aspects of our blessings are most important. It is God who, by his divine power, blesses us with spiritual blessings. These spiritual blessings are sufficient for life; the wellness of our body and external concerns. They are also and more importantly crucial for godliness and wellness of spirit and soul.

The location of these spiritual blessings are in heavenly places. Matthew 6 gives us some securities about treasures in heaven that can be applied to the spiritual blessings. Something to note though, is that there is a difference between us storing treasures in heaven and the spiritual blessings mentions in this text. As was stated before the spiritual blessings are given to us by God of his own volition. They are not acquired through right actions, but more through right relationship with God. This relationship as we will see is comes to us through the election of God.

The security of the heavenly treasures nonetheless applies to the spiritually gives. “…but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.” (Matthew 6:20) Whether the moth, rust or thieves refer to the actual insects and intruders or to the diverse schemes of the enemy, the assurance still stands. They are secure in heavenly places. This security is also premised on the fact that these things are in Christ.

Paul speaks about the state of being in Christ throughout the book of Ephesians. As we go through Ephesians we will look at the in Christ clause as it relates to the individual aspects of the Christian life. Since I believe that the clause itself is fixed, all-secure and all-powerful, but the object that is in the clause helps us to understand the clause in its specific situation.