"Your Father’s Nose"
EPISODE 185
Live with Renewed Purpose
How are we created FOR good works but not saved as a result of works (Eph. 2:9-10)? And how are people like zombies wandering around malls? This week we talk through Ephesians 2:1-10, finding good reason for humility and joy in God’s love and grace! We imagine the view, looking out from an open tomb and celebrate the truth that we now sit with Christ in the heavenly places. And we begin the discussion of our “walk” — a conversation that we’ll consider through the remainder of the book. It’s session 4 of Talking Through Ephesians — go to biblegeeks.fm/ephesians to find the videos, guides, and more!
Takeaways
The Big Idea: Without God's love and grace, we'd still stumble through our days, dead in our sins.
This Week's Challenge: Write out all the verses with the word "walk" in Ephesians.
Episode Transcription
That's better than having your father's nose or something. Oh man, unfortunately, right? Hello, hello everyone and welcome to the Bible Geeks Podcast. This is episode 185. I'm Bryan Schiele. I'm Ryan Joy. And thanks so much everyone for tuning in. We're back. This is session four of our Talking Through Ephesians guided study, and we are picking off chapter two verses one to ten. And this is, I think, where we move past some of the flowery, flowy expressions that Paul has been giving to us here in this first chapter. And now we get into really some challenging, meaty, weighty, difficult things as we get into chapter two, but still good things, I think. Yeah, yeah. The first few verses here are not as pleasant to think about, but then it gets better. Yeah, anytime you start off a chapter by saying "and you were dead" yeah, definitely challenging. Let's kick this thing off with our conversation starter on that note, which we called The Walking Dead. This is Talking Through Ephesians. The Walking Dead. What's the deal with our culture's zombie obsession today? From big budget blockbusters to B-movies, people seem to have an insatiable appetite for the undead. Maybe it's the way they stumble around with their twisted and dark desires that resonates with us on a deeper level. But as Paul begins this second chapter of Ephesians, we learn a far more frightening fact. You were the walking dead. "So here's the big idea. Without God's love and grace, we'd still stumble through our days, dead in our sins. Whether we knew it or not, we were living our lives, going to school, sitting in traffic, eating dinner with our families, without actually being alive. We followed our passions and did what felt good, all under the direction of the Prince of the Power of the Air. But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. In a shocking twist, through Christ we've been reanimated, where once we wandered selfishly and aimlessly, now we live new lives honoring our King. It's a transformation only God could do, the way he did when he raised Christ from the grave. There's no room for pride about our newfound life. God saved us when we couldn't save ourselves. We deserved death, but God gracefully does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. Psalm 103 verse 10. Now we're God's workmanship, created for His purposes. walk in newness of life, doing good as we gratefully rejoice in His mercy and love for us. So here's the big question. How will you respond now that God has brought you back to life? So follow along with this guided study at bibleGeeks.fm/ephesians and may the Lord bless you and keep you. Shalom. So the big idea we talked about there, without God's love and grace, we'd still stumble through our days dead in our sins. So Asher just had a birthday party that was themed around plants versus zombies. That's how I spent last weekend was we had a little cake. I don't know if you, I feel like that's a game from 16 years ago or something, but he found it on an iPad and he loves it. We don't let him play it very often, but he thinks it's the coolest. And the idea of zombies just seems like they're everywhere. I saw that there's a Disney show called zombies. This is my world with little kids and everything. And they're just everywhere. This picture of these stumbling, undead brain eaters or whatever. And I think it does kind of resonate this idea. I always noticed too in the old zombie movies, there were a lot of them where they were zombies like stumbling around a shopping mall or something. Like just these brain dead. Yeah, right. Yeah, that's what it's just, that's basically, it feels like what you're seeing when you look around the shopping mall somehow. There's just this sense that a lot of people are not awake. There's a sense of, I don't know, I mean, we all have been there. I sometimes feel like I'm sleepwalking through life, and certainly there is a way of life that is enslaved to sin, that is dead, that isn't aware. Paul says later on in, I think, chapter five, "Wake up, O sleeper, arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you." And some people have theorized that maybe that was a baptismal song, but whatever the deal, that's just such a powerful alternative to this idea, because that brain dead, sin enslaved, bumble through life can be transformed into a circumspect awareness that fills us with joy and life, as you said in the conversation start, as Jesus reanimates us. - No, I think you're right on though. And I was at the mall today and I can confirm. There were a lot of people just bumbling around and yeah, we do that all the time. I do that all the time. - Cell phones don't help. - No, they do not, absolutely. So that leads us to the big question here in this conversation starter, which was, how will you respond now that God has brought you back to life? And it kind of reminds me of the way that the children of Israel responded as they came out of Egypt. They were enslaved there, obviously. They had spent so many years at Pharaoh's hand in his beck and call. And after they left, after they went across the Red Sea and they were traveling through the wilderness, sure, they complained a little bit, a lot of bit actually, but they wound up effectively giving everything they had in Exodus 36. When it came time to sacrifice what they had to build the tabernacle, the Lord's sanctuary, they just kept giving and giving. - No more, no more. - Exactly. You guys gotta stop. You've just given too much. Because I think a lot of them realized where they came from and where they were now. They were slaves and now they've been set free. Now they're basically in the presence of God. How amazing is this? And so they just keep sacrificing and giving. And I think that's what happens when you're a people who realize what's actually happened to you. - I love that place that you just brought us back to 'cause I do think in this Hebrew Jewish mindset that Paul is looking at all of these concepts from, that the redemption of Israel is in the background of it. That there's this redemption, this bringing out of slavery that's in the background. But we're gonna take it to a very different place. (laughing) Very different place with this icebreaker question this week. We're going back to those embarrassing photos and asking what embarrassing fashion trend from your past do you hope never comes back? - Oh man, this is such a good question 'cause for all of us, depending on your age, you're gonna have a very different answer. But me, as a elder millennial at this point, going back to high school thinking in the pre-2000s, late '90s styles that were going on, it is kinda weird right now to see kids wearing the same types of stuff that I used to wear in high school. And it is, it's totally coming back. Ratty, old baggy clothes. I would take that any day by the way over like the skimpy tight jeans and things that reveal way too much But we wore a lot of material and fabric back in the day And I think I'd probably be okay if like those JNCO jeans or like massively baggy pants never came back I used to have some pants that like I couldn't even see my shoes. Seriously. I don't even know how I walked I think the backs of all of my pants were just completely tore up from stepping on them all the time Cause yeah, we had a lot of fabric on our lower section there and I would be just as happy as a clam Never to see that trend return for sure. What about you? I'm gonna take you back a little further Back to 11 12 year old Ryan in the late 80s I had a lot of like pink Bermuda shorts that no one ever needs to see I remember one pair That was like hot pink with a tiger stripe kind of thing going on and in fact, I had the poofy hair with the skater cut over my eyes that went with it too. I thought I was like the ultimate skateboarder guy. And it's not my proudest moment, but I'll share it here with all of you and move on. - Pink Bermuda shorts and baggy pants need to stay in the past. And as we move forward to our next section here on the episode, our actually important segment here on the episode, let's go to find Jesus here in Ephesians chapter two, verses one to 10. And this section is iconic really, as we already said, it begins with Paul saying, "And you were dead in the trespasses and sins "in which you once walked." And you can see that language of the zombies there walking around. We followed the course of this world, we followed the prince of the power of the air, and then something changed. But God is like two of the most powerful words in this section. But God being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. Now things have changed. Now we can be alive. And it's just amazing what he talks about here in this grace that's been extended to us. Where do we find Jesus here in this section about going from death to life? - Well, over and over again, it's in Christ Jesus, in Christ Jesus, in Christ Jesus. Christ is the clear expression of the Father's mercy and grace. He is where the love of God is found. And I think the main idea of this passage is that God's love for us is bonkers. It's crazy, it doesn't make any sense. It's amazing, it's abundant, and Paul's just like looking for, he doesn't use, I haven't seen a translation with the word bonkers, but it's like, you know. - No, I was gonna say. Lots of superlatives though, for sure. - Yes, yeah. - Yes. - And it's all in Christ. Only in Him do we see it, only in Him do we receive it, as we sometimes sing, in Christ alone. And so if God is pouring out His love, Jesus is the pitcher filling our cups. If God is lavishing riches on us, Christ is like the Venmo transfer. If God has brought us back to life after we flatlined, Christ is the resuscitating paddles or the injection, he's the way of salvation, he is the rescue. This passage, it's just, it gives initiating credit to God's love, certainly not to us, but to God's love. But over and over, it tells us that only in Christ will we receive what the Father has brought us? He is giving it to us in and through Jesus. - I love the enabling way that we see Paul talking about here, how Jesus is the catalyst that's making these things happen. He's the one who's connecting us to the Father and doing the Father's will and accomplishing everything in the Father. So cool to think about. But I also get this picture here when he uses this term raised up with him, especially in light of the picture that he's presenting here with going from death to life. And he's gonna talk about this a little bit more, so I'm not gonna talk too much about it in the next few chapters. But as he talks about how Jesus raised from the dead, we are raised up with him. And there's some chapters where you get a picture in your mind, and this picture that I get in my mind seeing this or thinking about this is really going from being dead to being alive. I get this picture that I wake up and I'm inside the tomb, and I'm looking out through the entrance where the stone is rolled away and Jesus is out there on the other side of the door, reaching his hand back inward toward the inside of the tomb where I am. And he's just saying, "Let's go, let's go." You know, it's just this cool way of thinking about being raised up with him. Like, it's the same kind of picture, I think, when we go on later to talk about dying with Christ. It's like, I wasn't there on the cross, but I can put myself in that place mentally to think about that. But here being raised up with him, as Jesus is coming out of the grave, we get to escape our spiritual death and have a second chance at life. And he's paving the way for us as we follow in his footsteps out of that grave to walk a new life. A new walk is just so cool to think about how Jesus is the one who we're raised up with. We're raised up with him or in him as we've been talking about. - Mm-hmm. That's such a powerful picture. Hey, what are you doing in there? Why are you still back there? - Yeah. - Fun, life is out here, and I've opened it. The stone is not blocking your way, come on out, man. That's a really cool thought, and that maybe leads us to some other cool, maybe deep thoughts. (audience applauding) - And now, deep thoughts. - So obviously, Paul has a lot of depth in this section, and maybe we're gonna pull out some of our favorite deep thoughts from these first 10 verses of chapter two of Ephesians. Where do you go in thinking about Paul's powerful words here. - The first thing I think about is, how is it that we're not saved as a result of works? He makes that statement, but we're created for good work. So he uses this word works in these two different ways. And it really does help that Paul has written a lot of other letters about this subject that we have access to. And he has really fleshed this idea out. Not that it keeps people from getting confused about it, but he's really thought through it and articulated this a lot, but it's also helpful to notice the progression in this passage. These 10 verses really are one statement that he's building from verses one to three, where we have that awful picture of humanity, we're dead, we're following the course of the world, the prince of the air, the spirit now at work in the sons of disobedience, all this stuff, the passions of our flesh, really awful picture. And then it ends in that other place. And in between there's, you've already brought it out. Those two powerful words, but God, it reminds me of in Romans chapter three, there's this same thing that happens, but now I think chapter three, verse 21, I think he's like given this big picture of just the awfulness that we're in on our own of our own accord, we are floundering. And then there's, but now, but God. As in we're in deep trouble, but God did something. Not, but Ryan, not, but the very best humans, this is where you guys were, but because Bryan is awesome, here's what we have. It doesn't go like that. It's just, but God, what did God do, but God made us alive. - Except he doesn't want us to go right into what God did. He like interrupts himself to make it clear that it is because of God's goodness, God's grace, not our lovable sweetness that God did this. Listen to how hard he's trying to get that across. It says in verse four, "But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved." So the rescue had to start with God and it's because of who God is. So it's by grace through faith. In other words, the thing that distinguishes those who are His from others is that we place our loyalty and trust in Jesus Christ and He changes everything for us. By grace salvation comes, but through faith we are God's people. God has made this new creation now. Having saved us, His workmanship, He's made us to have this new path. And so the journey from those dead fools in verses 1 to 3 to living workmanship has led to a different kind of human modeled after Christ going about doing good. So the result is good works, but it's not a result of good works. And particularly, I think works there in that first sense of the works of the law. The works of the law don't do it. It's faith. It's faith that is this relational quality that certainly involves obedience, but it's not a meritorious thing. It's not something that we're building our own ladder to heaven. we are saved because of who God is. And that's really the point of this passage. - Yeah, yeah, I think you hit the nail on the head there. And it is so funny to think about what is such a practical book, especially in the last three chapters, Ephesians four through six. This book is so practical. So he's obviously not throwing out the fact that we do have good things that we should be doing and that we should be responding like we talked about in that conversation starter, responding to this amazing salvation in certain ways, but it's definitely not because we were so awesome. So it's a cool way of thinking about that as we start this off. I was thinking about the same thing. When he's talking about this walking language, how we started out this section, you were walking in your trespasses, dead in your sins, like the walking dead as we've been talking about. We starting to set up this more practical conversation later on, but as he bookends this section with walking language, now he keeps it general. He's not getting into specifics. He's talking about our choices. He's talking about our words, our thoughts, our attitudes, basically everything that defines who we are. That's what he's talking about when he's using this language, walking. And so he's contrasting the lifestyle, the way we used to walk, the things we used to say, the thoughts we used to have, the attitudes that we used to have, the way we used to live, then the way that we should be walking now. We have these good works prepared for us that we should now walk in them. Now our walk changes. Now we walk like Jesus. Now we follow in his footsteps. And I don't think Paul is intending to be overly generic here, because anytime you really talk about walking, it is sort of, it's like, "Okay, come on, Paul, get to the practical stuff. Get to the super specific thing. How could I walk or how should I walk?" But obviously, he's trying to get us to see more importantly that we were broken in the way that we were walking. Everything we were doing, we were completely just dead in our sins, in our trespasses, and everything else that we were following was just wrong, but everything that Christ enables us to become is healthy and wholesome and is good and has direction and clarity to it. So as Paul is sort of talking about generically walking, he's going to get much more specific later on. Yeah, that setup of putting walking here before he hits walking over and over again in four through six is a good thing. I hadn't even thought of that, actually, even though we called it the walking dead, that he is. He's setting it up with that same word. You were walking in this broken way, and now you are walking in the Christ way, in the new human way that's meant to be holy and healthy and alive. So my second deep thought has to do with this idea that we have risen with Christ and are now seated with him. I think that's a puzzle worth contemplating. How am I seated with him? - We talked a little bit about it on the last episode and I'm glad we're circling back to it. - We did, yeah, 'cause I'm pretty sure I'm sitting here in a rolly chair at my desk recording with you. - I've heard your squeaky chair throughout the conversation. - Yes, squeaky chair has made an appearance. There's an old Rolling Stones song. I actually don't like this song at all. I think it's pretty gross, but it's called "Under My Thumb." And so Mick Jagger sings about how the girl who used to have power over him is now under his power. And there's another song that I remember that talked about chasing a bully to the back of the bus and letting them be scared of you. And it's these two songs about this kind of reversal where someone had power over you and now you're switching it up. And in a way, I think that kind of reversal goes with something that's happening here. The one who had you under their power now has no power over you. You've grown bold and strong and filled with life. We've talked about being in Christ, so that what transpires in Him transpires in us. We're in Christ, we're with Christ in all of these things. And so to be seated in the heavenlies is to reign. That's the idea of being seated there. It's not about taking a breather. It's about sitting at the throne, at the right hand of God. And to be seated in the heavenlies is to have power and dominion. We used to be under the Prince of the air and the powers of darkness. And we used to be so deceived and just following the children of wrath, he says, like the rest of mankind. That's who we were. But God has lifted us up. And now we're raised up with him, and not only raised up so that we have life, but we're seated with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. So there we are now above all of these powers, able to break free of that, the fear of death that Satan used to use as Hebrews 2 talks about to keep us enslaved, the habits and guilt and patterns of sin, all the things that, the blindness to what these realities are, all the things that used to enslave us, now we're in a different place because we have been lifted up with Jesus to a different status and everybody knows it. Everybody in the heavenly places knows who we are now. We stand with Jesus who is above everything and we are in Him. And what are they gonna do now? That they're gonna hope to just find us separating ourselves from Him and walking away from that faith and loyalty. But if we are in Christ, we are with Him, resurrected and seated with Him. Looking forward, of course, to a more complete fulfillment of that promise that someday we will have not only resurrected spirits, but resurrected bodies, new bodies that are changed, our bodies changed into that body like Jesus has, as so much of the New Testament talks about, and live with him in a different place, a different kind of a realm. But already, that change has happened, so that as we're walking here, there's another, you think of Colossians three, set your mind on things above where Christ is and where your life is hidden with Christ. We think about those higher things because we are with Christ in those higher realities. It's so interesting to think about what Paul is doing here. You know, he is talking about the fact that we are seated with Christ, but it's such a different picture in my mind when I go to Revelation 3, and I hear Jesus saying this from the first person. He's basically saying exactly the same thing to the church there. He says in verse 21, "The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my father on his throne." It's like, whoa. I mean, it's one thing for Paul to say it, like, hey, you go sit over there with him. And it's another thing for Jesus to say, hey, you come sit over here with me. Like in the first person, he's inviting us to come and to have this relationship. And it doesn't feel like a place where we should be sitting. And I think that actually leads to my second deep thought here, which was basically about pride. It is so interesting that Paul is really trying to make sure that we don't get too puffed up about stuff. And I think he's putting the kibosh on this right away because he knows what we are want to do under our own direction. Right. He knows. So true. He knows exactly where we would want to go. Don't sit there, bro. Thinking you're hot stuff for being a disciple. You'd still be six feet under if it wasn't for God's grace. You would still be dead in your sins if it wasn't for his willingness and love and mercy to send Jesus to pull you back out of the grave. Like you had nothing to offer. There was no power that I had to pull myself out of my condition. The only cure for our situation was Christ. And so you can see why he has to remind us of this though, because wouldn't it just be so easy to weaponize our works? like, "Look at what I'm doing." And this is, it's definitely easy for us to say, it's something that people already talk about in religious contexts. People in religious circles already love to talk about how popular they are, or they love to, you know, how many people read my blog, or how many people listen to my podcast, or how many people hit like on my posts. It's like, even people who are meaning well still love to hold up their works and take such pride in them and things like that. Of course, Paul is trying to fend off people from doing what they naturally would want to do. But man, what a wake up call. Paul gets that people are going to boast. So let's make sure to remind them just right off the bat, hey, it's not about you. This is definitely an antidote for pride as you read through this and realize how small a part of the equation you are. It doesn't mean you do nothing. But boy, yeah. be so proud that we're able to take a step onto the rescue boat that came out to save you. Okay, great. You had faith and you decided to trust the Lord and walk with Him. But yeah, this whole passage, sometimes Paul does this thing where he'll talk to the Gentiles and then he'll talk to the Jews. There's the you, and then us, and we were, and all of this kind of thing. But here, when you get to the, even when we were dead in our trespasses, everybody is included in this. It doesn't matter who you are. If you are saved, it is by grace that you have been saved. It is not your own doing. That's the phrase that is the center of what you're saying. This is not your own doing. - That is a bonus deep thought, I think, here, in that he does go from talking about you were dead and you were dead, and then he transitions that to, and we, we all once lived in the past. He's definitely not being exclusionary here. Everybody gets lumped into this same boat. So let's move on to our last segment here on the episode, and that is our reach out question. ♪ Reach out, reach out and touch someone ♪ So our question for this session and the guide to study is what changes for you when you see yourself as God's workmanship? And it's a pretty cool picture, the way he closes out this section in verse 10, how he says, "For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." What changes for you when you see yourself that way? - Well, we've hinted at this from the beginning of this study, this idea that God is doing something big in us. And like, why us? But he's chosen to do that. He's chosen to make us his workmanship and this word can have the sense of an artist's masterpiece. It means something special that God is producing. And the point isn't the greatness of the creation, but of the creator. You look at the creation of something and you say, "Wow, someone really good must have done that." And that's what God is aiming to do in us. And this will keep coming up as we talk about what the church is and God's plan and this big struggle and all of those things. And so whenever I see that God has been at work and has plans for me and wants me to do something meaningful and good with the new life he's given, it does as we've said this in different ways, but it does give me focus and new awareness of my identity that I am a part of something that matters and that my choices matter and that loving and living like Christ and putting my faith in Christ, all of this really matters. It's about more than just is Jesus your personal Savior so that He can save you and it's just you and Jesus and that's all that matters. Of course, He is my personal Savior because it is personal. Everything is personal. It's about something much bigger that God has planned in the church. It's about the world. It's about others It's about things beyond this world And so I guess that's my answer is what changes for me when I see myself as God's workmanship As I realize that I have a place in God's plan and he wants to do something with me Paul says in Philippians 1 6 he who began a good work in you is gonna see it through he's not gonna abandon it He's going to keep working in you or in Philippians two, verse 13, that it is God who is at work in you to will and to work for his good pleasure. So to recognize that God is up to something and I want to be his partner and be up to this big thing with him. - That's a really interesting thought there too, that it's not a small thing. Like God's plan for you is not that you would like learn how to play the piano or like, you know, his plan for you is not that you would find a really solid parking spot at the mall. Like it's really, God's plan for you is huge and it's sweeping and it involves so many things. And yeah, just to see our role in that is really humbling in one way, but it's also, it makes you feel good. It makes you feel valued and special that you have an important role in the plans that he has for the entire world. - There's a quote that we've said, these two kind of paradoxical quotes that we've talked about before, it's all up to you. It has nothing to do with you. (laughing) - Exactly, for sure. Yeah, I was thinking about this question, what changes for me as I see myself as God's workmanship? And it reminds me of how right now I've been organizing our family photos. Seems like a totally weird place to take this, but over the past few months, I've been dumping all of our old family photos into our shared library. And so Sharilyn has been like, she's a nostalgia freak. She loves to go back and look at pictures and scroll through things. And so this is just, she's been eating it up. She turns to me the other night and she pulls up her phone and she shows me a picture and she puts, basically it's a picture of me and my dad, and she puts a thumb over my face and she's like, "Look, you guys are exactly the same because there's a strong family resemblance there." And I think about myself as God's workmanship, God as my father who has created me, who has made me. I want people to see that kind of family resemblance there too. God who has created me, who has formed me, who has plans for me, I want to go out into the world. I want to walk around in a way that would make Him proud. And again, it's a weird thing to think about as we've been talking about humility and not taking our accomplishments so seriously or thinking that they've really earned me anything. But at the same time, I want to just be like the children of Israel were when they realized the slavery they came out of and just kept giving and giving. I think when I see that he's working in me, I want people to see God in me. I want people to see that I'm connected to the Father. I'm part of his family. And so God's features are my features. His purpose is my purpose. I want people to see that I'm made in his image, that I'm always gonna look like him as my head and my leader, that I can try to pave my own way. But every time I look in the mirror, I'm gonna see that he's reflected back to me. And of course I'm looking at Jesus. I'm thinking about the person and the work and the love of Jesus. And so thinking about being God's creation, I love him, I want to love him more and I wanna love other people more because of my love for him. Again, he's telling me to walk this way. He's showing me how to be when I look to him. And it is very much like in that same way of just wanting to make my dad proud, you know, make my family proud of who I am and the person that I am, not just because I look like them, but because I have the same values that they've instilled in me, and even more so with God, obviously. - Yeah, that's a neat way to think of it. I think Paul really takes it there at the beginning of chapter five, right? - Yep. - Imitate God as beloved children, like you've got your father's way about you, you know? - That's better than having your father's nose or something. - Oh man. Unfortunately, right? (both laughing) - Ooh, boy. (both laughing) But what a cool thing to look to our Father and be holy as He is holy and to have other people even be able to see, wow, where did that love come from? Oh, he must get it from his Father. That's a family thing. - And definitely compared to where we were, children of wrath. - Yes, yeah, yeah. - Oh man, now we're children of the Father. It's like the things have changed here. So cool to think about. All right, so let's move on to our challenge for the week and here we go. I am ready to face any challenges that might be foolish enough to face me. >> Okay. So this week's challenge goes to something Bryan talked about earlier, and that's how this word walk shows up here in not the best way, us walking as dead people here. The challenge is to write out all the verses with the word walk in Ephesians. So you can look that up and go track it down, and you're going to find a theme that really starts to play out. I think this is an interesting Bible study type of challenge that fits what we're doing here. I love these kinds of little things. Write out all the verses or highlight all the verses. This is also be a good idea if you are the kind of person who marks in their Bible. Find all the words for walk and highlight them or mark them in some way. And it is really helpful as you zoom out because I think when you start to see this letter as a whole, you see these touches of this word walk here right off the bat in the first three chapters or so. And then when you get to that super practical section in Chapter 4, it's like, "BOOM!" There they are. And it's, he's prepping us to, to really understand some details, even though right now in this section, they don't really feel like details. They feel like he's glossing over it and being generic. I like that. I think it's already here in this passage, it's twice that it shows up. I didn't even notice that. And then, yeah, we're gonna hit it hard. And that's really, Maybe the key word of the second half of the book probably is how we walk. So let's go from our challenge to our closing prayer. The prayer suggestion that we put in our study guide was, "Dear Savior, bless you for bringing me back to life." So a statement of praise going with what we're doing here and what we see in Ephesians two verses four and five. Let's go to God in prayer. "Lord God, you are our Savior. May we praise you forever." We still haven't figured it all out and we certainly are still completely reliant on you. We still stumble and lose our way, but we are not what we were because of you, because of your power and your grace and what Jesus has done for us. Thank you for continuing to purify us of our guilt, to direct us in our ways. You and you alone give us life. You give us direction and forgiveness that we could never hope to achieve through whatever schemes or cleverness or whatever ways we might try to get to you. We find you as you reveal yourself to us and we find you as we trust in you and we place our confidence in you now. Again, we rededicate ourselves to you, to live for you just as we live through you. We pray that Jesus' sacrifice and His resurrection and His reign will never lose its meaning for us. Father, we are your creation. We are your workmanship. And we pray that your spirit would fill us, that Christ would fill us, that you would strengthen us and support us as we strive today to do good works and live in your image. We pray this in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. - Amen. All right, so on the next episode, our fifth guided study session in this Talking Through Ephesians series, we're gonna be talking about Ephesians chapter two, verses 11 to 22, we are moving forward, and we're gonna be talking about one new humanity, how Jesus really has brought us all together and created one new people out of a random, disparate whole bunch of just scattered people who, yeah, we were all kind of just floating around like those people in the mall I saw today. So if you wanna prepare for that conversation, you can read Ephesians chapter two, verses 11 to 22. And as you do, maybe it would be good to also think about chapter four, because Paul definitely nods to some things he's gonna talk a little bit more about later on in the letter. Very cool section, definitely as we've been talking about here, a real heavy hitter in these first few sessions of our series. - They're all heavy hitters, they're all greatest hits. (laughing) Yeah, it'll really be cool, this idea of humanity and this idea of being a people where God lives. God's dwelling place. So it'll be exciting to get into it. - Cool. All right, thanks so much everyone for tuning in to the Bible Geeks Podcast. You can find us on our website at biblegeeks.fm. You can find show notes for this episode in your podcast player of choice or at biblegeeks.fm/185. You can also find this series at biblegeeks.fm/ephesians. And until next episode, everyone, may the Lord bless you and keep you. - Shalom. (upbeat music)