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Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Ephesians 1:6

to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.
-Ephesians 1:6

I find myself a little confused by this verse at first.  What does " to the praise of his glorious grace" mean?  I think NLT helps for my understanding of this verse, "So we praise God for the glorious grace he has poured out on us who belong to his dear Son".  So, as a result of what Paul has just said, we praise God for his glorious grace.  Because God has "predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ", we praise him for God's grace.  This that God has done for us is God's grace, "which he so freely bestowed on us in the Beloved" as it says in AMP.  We didn't work or earn any of this.  God chose according to his will to do this for us, and for that we're praising.  One last thing to point out is the word at the end, "Beloved".  This is referring to Jesus, "Beloved [His Son, Jesus Christ]" as we see from AMP.  It is in Jesus that we are blessed, just as the last verse said that we are predestined for adoption through Jesus Christ.  God chose to have Jesus be the instrument of his grace through which and in whom we have been blessed.  "So we praise God for the glorious grace he has poured out on us", "which He so freely bestowed on us in the Beloved [His Son, Jesus Christ]".  Sure, I mashed two different translations together, but I didn't like how NLT kept out the last part, or rather how they interpreted it differently.

Update:
I was listening to Matt Chandler's sermon at Code Orange and he was going over this verse.  His interpretation of this passage is that "to the praise of his glorious grace" means that the underlying meaning for it all is for God's glory.  I guess that fits in quite well and it's very similar to what Paul says earlier in this passage.  Hm...

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