The Difference Between Life and Death

Before you start todays devotional, ask the Lord to use it to grow you up in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Once, we were dead. We lived according to the world’s principles, energized by the evil one who prompted us to disobey God. Our sins chained us up, and Satan led us around like fools. Without Christ, we’re spiritual zombies.

That’s what spiritual death looks like. Our bodies are alive, but our spirits are dead.

“But God ….” That little conjunction changes someone from being dead to alive. “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us…made us alive together with Christ” (vv. 4-5). God is rich in mercy, not too-little-too-late, but has oceans of mercy—all we need. The only requirement is that we believe Him.

What does it mean to be saved by God’s grace? When we couldn’t save ourselves, God reaches down in grace. Why? It’s not because we were good and beautiful and were serving Him. The reason is in Him. His love for us gets His attention and motivates Him to extend grace and save us.

God loves you but can’t slip you into heaven just because He loves you. God is also light, and as the moral ruler of the universe, He is righteous, holy, and good. He can’t break His own standard. So God couldn’t save us by love—so instead, He paid the penalty for our sins and made a way to save us.

If you believe in the name of Jesus Christ, you can be sure you are saved. But it rests on God’s grace—not on your faithfulness. If you are a child of God, you may wander from Him, but He will always make a way back for you because by His grace alone, you are saved. You have a finished salvation; it’s not an “I hope so” salvation or an “I’ll try” salvation. Your salvation was completed by God’s grace, by means of faith, and not by anything you do. You can’t boast about it; it’s a gift. It’s all of God and not of us.

It’s His love in action.

The process of salvation goes like this: You finally get sick of your sins. You turn from yourself—from the things of the world, religion, everything the Bible condemns—and turn to Jesus Christ, then He gives you to the faith. God will draw every willing heart to Himself. Sin is the real problem behind our deaf ear to His Word; that’s even why many saints don’t enjoy their salvation as they should. We are stubborn about admitting and surrendering our favorite sins.

Even when we mess up, God doesn’t give up on us. In fact, we are His personal project, His work of art, His new creation. All together, we build His church, His workmanship, created in Jesus Christ for good works. He planned fruitful lives for us that please Him. And while we are now seated in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus, we are also walking down here in a way that brings glory to His name.

But this isn’t the case for those still living zombie lives, “without God in the world” (v. 12). As a result, they wander around in the darkness with no hope. If this world is their only hope, then they better squeeze this life like an orange and get all the juice they can get out of it because there’s nothing to look forward to after death. That is what it would be like to be without hope and without God.

This is what it means to be lost. But Ephesians 2:13 says, “But now in Christ Jesus….” There’s good news ahead.

1. If those without Christ are dead spiritually, what should we expect from their words and actions?

2. Why wasn’t love enough for God to accomplish our salvation?

3. How should the fact that our salvation is already accomplished by the grace of God change the way we think about ourselves?

Additional Resources

Listen to Dr. J. Vernon McGee's complete audio teachings of Ephesians 2:1-3, Ephesians 2:1-7 and Ephesians 2:8-13.